God- Father of Mischief
by KrispiKreme
Summary: When Loki is made Godfather of a Midgardian child, he decides to take his duty rather seriously.
1. Asgard is Inappropriate AF

**A/N Okay guys! This is my husband's work. He wants reviews and comments but refuses to make his own account so I'll pass along anything posted here especially ones that encourage him to be a gigantic nerd like me and make his own freaking account so he can post more often. Love and hugs, nerds!**

 **A/N v2- This story is mostly Norse Mythology with some Avengers style thrown in. It's also got 3 separate timelines based on whose POV it is so keep that in mind while reading.**

"Loki, you're going to want to see this!" Shouted Odin from across the great hall.

Loki of Asgard strode across the hall to the seat from which Odin watches over the world. "I swear father, if this is another cat video I'm going to shave your head in your sleep."

Odin scoots to the side and pats the spot next to him giving Loki an expectant look. Loki stares for a second at Odin, dumbfounded. Odin looks hurt, huffs, and dramatically over exaggerates how old he is as he slowly groans his way out of the throne.

Loki gets a small thrill as he pretends to be the only one in the room, climbing the steps to his throne, as he is finally king. He opens his eyes and snaps back to reality. He sits down, and instantly his inner vision is swept to a living room in London.

"Local Cardiff man states he has no friends or family aside from his wife, and has decided to name his newborn daughter's Godfather as the Norse God Loki. Loki is the Norse god of mischief and has seen some popularity after being portrayed in a local comic book turned action blockbuster. Loki: Doer of Good, Doer of Evil, is set to hit theaters this summer and will be played again by Tom Hiddelston, who has recently voted Only Pretty Boy In Hollywood That Is Still A Badass by the readers of Ridiculous Amounts of Fanfiction Weekly."

The Camera pans to a tan reporter of Indian descent with long dark brown hair and a professional looking pink skirt suit, and scruffy looking skinhead with a swastika tattoo on his neck with the letters "HH" on either side. "Yeah wot, like, if I'mma have a girl for a son," the reporter blinks, "then she's gotta have a god father. I figured, since no one's better'n me to raise'r up, then the next best thing'as gotta be the devil 'imself but for pure aryan folk, roight?"

The vision quickly faded as Loki stepped down from the throne. "What a horrible man," Odin remarks as Loki recovers his bearings. "But you always talk about how me and your brother get all the followers, and you get all the fangirls. I figured you could use a win. Someone has named you as protector of their daughter."

Loki smiles softly, "By the looks of this disgusting human I think we should suffice it to say that she is lucky that her father, even if by accident, made one good decision in his miserable life."

Odin's face pales. "You aren't... taking this charge seriously... are you?"

Loki smiles at Odin and suavely slithers out a cool turn of speech thick with venom and intent. "Relax old man, I never take anything seriously, you know that."

Odin straightens up, "Let me rephrase, I forbid you from doing this girl any harm, and I forbid you from..."

"ODIN!" A woman's voice cuts through the god-king's speech.

"Shite..." Odin whispers, "Yes dear?"

A woman of stunning beauty and grace who appears to be in her late 50's but with twice the vitality of any younger woman walks tall and confidently into the hall. "Odin, Loki is within his rights to protect this girl should he so choose, and more importantly you are NOT within your rights to forbid him! MOST Importantly, he desperately needs to get out among the people and better his reputation ever since that film in which he destroyed most of New York!"

Odin turns red, "Who is king here Frigga?!"

Frigga turns redder, "Don't you King me you lousy brute!"

"Runes damn your hide woman!"

"I'll tell everyone of your guy friends about your trip to Seidhr camp and how enthusiastic you were during your initiation!"

"You swore a sacred oath you scandalous..."

Odin and Frigga's voices trailed off as they continued arguing down a long hall way, all the way to the bedroom. The door slammed shut, and a lock clicked. The shouting never seemed to stop although it became less angry and more... passionate.

Loki rocked back and forth on his heels waiting patiently. He checked a very expensive and sleek looking watch of dwarven crafting on his wrist and let out a puff of air that blew a strand of slightly oily straight black hair covering his face.

Time faded in and out and Loki eventually found himself napping on a bench his hair sprawled on either side and his ram horned helmet still rocking to and fro from where it had clearly fallen off his head minutes earlier.

Odin emerged from the room shirtless and glistening with sweat. Two insultingly beautiful Valkyrie, one ballerina thin with pale freckled skin, turquoise eyes, and red hair, the other curvy, overly endowed, skin black as midnight with an afro tied back away from her forhead with a gold band, drunkenly stumbled their way past him. They looked at the grey bearded muscular figure, giggled, and flew haphazardly down the hallway mumbling something incoherent that ended "... she's even better than they say!". The laughter awoke Loki with a start and he stared both shocked and envious as the two beauties flew past. A tall, tan, and exceedingly masculine man with dark brown hair, black stubble, and massive muscles wearing only a towel followed soon after. There was some thing swinging back and forth beneath the towel that occasionally pressed against the front of it. Loki thought the man might be armed with a sword he could not see at first, then realization dawned on him. Loki looked up into the man's dark brown eyes and the man gave him a smirk and a wink.

Loki gulped down a lump in his throat, then looked at Odin who appeared very pleased with himself and a little dizzy. Finally Frigga emerged poised and confident in a silver nightgown that concealed her skin, but nothing of her figure. With a small smile for her love drunk king she stated, "Your father and I have discussed the matter thoroughly and in great detail."

Odin looked up and said, "It is my decree as King of Asgard, that you may act as god father to the girl, but you mustn't harm her or any human, and you musn't bestow upon her any gifts purchased outside of the Midgard Realm, without my permission. Now I need a nap."

Loki was about to express his gratitude, but his adoptive parents were already leaving.

Odin grabbed Frigga's hand and began slowly trudging back to the bedroom. Frigga tried to keep her voice down as she told Odin, "Next time, I get to ride the bull and YOU get to play with the two faeries..." Odin smacked her rump and she gave an excited squeek.

Loki wiped a bit of sweat from his brow and began walking quickly and purposefully down the hall to the gates outside of Bifrost. As he did he passed the massive brute from earlier still wearing his towel about to step into a nearby tavern. Loki stopped, stared, and looked towards to the bridge. Looked to the man. Looked back at the bridge. Then made his choice.

Loki stumbled out of the bathroom of the tavern a look of terror on his face. He shouted back, "How could you still have more Freyr? I don't care if you are the god of fertility and harvest, you are a mad man!" a deep inaudible and grumbling response from inside the bathroom and Loki responds, "No i'm not complaining, it was incredible just... for Odin's sake has anyone ever satisfied you?!" Another grumbling response. "OF COURSE YOU'D BRING MY BROTHER INTO THIS!"

Loki stormed out of the tavern and made his way to the Bifrost bridge. Heimdall stood with all the discipline of a stone wall. Nothing on his face or in his posture to betray any emotion. Loki began to speak, "I need to go to mi-"

"I know where you are going."

"That's right you see everything..." Loki responds.

"Yes." Replied Heimdall, stern and stoic.

"Ehem..." Loki clears his throat. "Everything?" Loki squeaks.

"Yyyyep..." Replies Heimdall. He glances at Loki a bit wide eyed and then regains his composure and stares forward.

"Oh shut up." Said Loki and stepped through the twisting vortex.


	2. Daddy Loki is Best Loki

A little girl sits in her stroller at the park crying. She doesn't have words yet to express that she is terrified. That she is hungry or uncomfortable or bored. All she can do is scream and hope that someone who cares will come help her. Just 15 feet away a bald gruff individual is kicking a soccer ball to other bald and intimidating looking men. He holds a beer in one hand and has his back turned to his daughter.

A tall and slender man with enrapturing green eyes and slick black hair walks by impeccably dressed. He kneels down in front of the small child. She has blue eyes that match her mother's, a small mercy that she did not inherent her father's beady squinty grey eyes. Odin passes a hand over and whispers something in a long forgotten language. "I claim you as my own, since this animal never would." The little girl laughs and gives out a little squeal, the kind of sound only a child can make. She blinks and when she opens her eyes they have turned a shade greener.

Loki looks towards the man and he hasn't noticed a stranger kneeling by his child. He gazes fiercely at the man and just as he kicks the soccer ball, it pops loudly like a balloon that's been stuck with a pin. The man jumps with a start and spills his cheap beer. "Ah shite!"

"Harold Language!" a woman's voice with a slight lilt of Irish hidden under a thick Londoner's cockney calls across the field. "There's a child about..."

"Oi shut yer gob, Martha! I spilled me beer all over me new Adidas! I'm a right mess now! I'm headed back to the flat." Replies Harold.

"It's your daughter's birthday, you'll come back when you're changed?" Asks Martha.

"Fat chance o'that..." says Harold under his breath as he stumbles off.

Martha leans against the picnic table staring at the big white birthday cake she made. Pink letters spell out "Happy Birthday Addy!" with pink sugar sprinkles all around the edges. The lettering is clearly done by amateur but with great care. A big number 1 candle sits unlit in the middle. A pile of paper plates and a big bucket of ice cream sits next to the cake. Martha looks up her lips pursed to hold back her temper as Harold and all of his friends walk off the field and back to the apartment. A cooler filled with ice and nothing else is a testament to the origin of the empty cans of beer tossed all over the grassy field near the deflated soccer ball.

The park is completely void of people save for Martha, little Addie, and the kind stranger who's stopped to make faces at her daughter. She holds it in for as long as she can, her tight lipped stern face hanging over the cake with her hands pressed on either side. Her knuckles turn white and her face turns red. She unintentionally barks out a little sob, and once the damn is broken she can't keep her composure any longer. She sobs over the cake she spent so many hours perfecting. She sobs over the cooler of beer she had to drag herself because her husband showed up late. She sobs for all the effort and care she gave to try to lure her husband and some of his friends so that there would be some people at her daughter's first birthday party.

She cries for her mother who passed before she could see her grand daughter. She cries for her daughter more than anything. Because she knows who her father is, and that she will grow up without respect or decency or care, all because she let the wrong guy in just once. Just once, and now she was a slave to her circumstances.

She lets it out alone in the field and then grabs a happy birthday napkin, wipes her tears and her snot from her face and she does what mothers do. She buries any sign of her pain, she puts a huge smile on her face and runs up to Addie in the stroller. "There's me little lass!" her natural Irish accent flows freely now that no one is here to chastise her. "Thank you for playin' with me little Addison kind sir, would you care for some cake! I baked it meself!"

The man turns to her and her heart drops to her stomach. He's beautiful. Unconventional, dark, with a sadness locked behind his green eyes, but bloody beautiful.

He smiles and says, "It would be my pleasure miss...?"

"Misses... Misses Donover..."

"I was meeting some friends in this park in a little while for tea, but they seem to be running a bit late. Since your party seems to have run afoul of a devious soccer ball, would you mind if we kept you company?" Loki replied.

Martha looked at the cake, the plates, the party hats, and the empty field. "It'll go to waste if no one..."

"Then it's settled!" Loki shouts.

He turns away and reaches into his pocket and pulls out a very strange looking phone, "Father." he says.

"I'm watching from the throne son, I saw it all, we're on our way." Replies Odin.

After what seems like no time at all Martha finds herself surrounded by the strangest, jolliest, most beautiful people she's ever seen. They came with meat, and ale, and a beautiful young girl that appeared 15 offered her a slice of the most perfect smelling apple pie she had ever seen. A biker who cared a tool belt with a very strange, fat looking hammer road in on a massive motorcycle that had "G.O.A.T." painted on the side came with a booming voice that laughed at every joke and drank more than any one of these strange merry people. Her daughter seemed to be the life of the party as everyone passed her around and joked with her and a strange, grandfatherly man with an eye patch made the silliest faces and laughed until he cried when she pulled his dark grey beard.

What was most peculiar was that all of them seemed to have brought gifts. The kind gentleman with the green eyes must have said something because they were clearly here for a little girl's birthday party and not a single cup of tea could be found.

The little girl's eyes were bright and a shocking shade green and happy and the mother realized that this was what she needed. She needed friends. She needed people who could be there for her. Only if Harold weren't so jealous, or at least if she could afford to leave him.

The grandfatherly man then stopped the ruckus. He stood on the table and pulled a golden ring off his arm. The green eyed gentleman nudged Martha and said, "You're going to like this bit."

The man in the eyepatch then performed a rather hokey bit of slight of hand magic, making the ring split into eight more rings. He then threw them to a stunning wild looking woman who had gifted her daughter a very innappropriate compound hunting bow with razor tipped arrows. The women introduced herself as "Scotty" earlier if Martha heard it right.

She caught all 9 rings and began to fit them around her foot in a sensual and wild way. She then managed to get the other foot through and slid the rings up her legs. The rings seems to get wider as if they stretched to fit her. She then pushed her arms through as they rose up to her hips. She begin making slow sensual circles with her hips. and widened her arms. The rings grow to be the size of hula hoops and Martha realized the gimmick of this trick.

Skadi then began to hula hoop with all nine of the rings to a rhythm that the biker with the hammer from before began drumming into the picnic table. Her hips swirled and her chest circled against the motion causing an alluring display if her tight, strong body. Then the beautiful wild creature rose her hands above her head, and clapped. The second she did, the rings all split into several more. With expert rhythm Skadi clapped again and the rings split again. She kept clapping until she was covered head to tow in a golden cylinder of rings. Loki walked up and kicked the rings aside and they clattered to the ground, proving that whoever was inside had vanished. Odin selected one of the rings and it shrunk to the sized of an arm band again. He handed it to the baby who began teething on it at once with a huge nose scrunching smile.

Martha jumped and let out a yell of surprise when the wild woman jumped from behind her and landed on the table with a thud. Martha laughed at her self and then politely applauded the wonderful magic show. She heard a strange squeal and the clattering of metal as she clapped and turned to look at her daughter. She was buried in a pile of the golden armbands. She fussed over her daughter for a second and turned back to the party with a smile and everyone had vanished.

The gifts and the cooler and the pile of rings were all neatly packed into a handcart. The plates and napkins were all piled into a mesh metal basket. Even the cans left out in the field by her husband and his friends had somehow made it into the recycling bin. Martha stared wide eyed as she began to try to make sense of the world around her. There was a business card with shining emerald green writing sitting on the picnic table. It simply read:

If you or your daughter need anything, whisper my name.

Loki of Asgard

 **️**


	3. Books Help With The Existential Despair

**A/N Hey guys! He was so excited to see that people favorited/followed/reviewed that he decided to continue this story! Keep it up!**

Jet black hair, deep green eyes, a dark green hoodie, and a solid gold bracelet that was given to her by her mother before she had passed away. The girl had pale skin with soft freckles and white wires hanging from out either side of her head traveling to the pockets of her jeans belying some sort of smart phone. She thought of herself as average looking, nothing special except for her dark green eyes. She was boring in her appearance in every way. Average face, average build, not too thick or curvy, nothing impressive about her breasts or her stomach or her behind. No abs or thigh gap or even the strange things mentioned in movies and old books like a long neck or beautiful wrists. No, she was totally grey. It was good this way though. She was sick of boys almost as much as she found it impossible to relate to other girls. She wasn't some rebellious loner or some mysterious poetic romantic waiting to blossom. She just was. She was nervous and lonely and unkempt and wholly untrained in the art of womanhood.

At school she kept to herself and by way of blending into the crowd managed to avoid the exciting drama of teenage life. Lacy got pregnant, Macy got herpes, Jacey got engaged again for the third time this semester, and Addison? Well she got mostly A's because she has no social life. At school she genuinely missed being part of something, anything that mattered, or having some sort of companionship. At school she hated being invisible and meaningless.

At home however, she knew that being invisible was the key to survival. She always went straight to her room, buried herself in the latest Maas novel, and didn't make a peep.

The house was the most confusing of living arrangements. The outside was ramshackle and run down. The roof leaked, the heater and the air conditioner never seemed to make it upstairs, and the place had a faint smell of mildew and trash. It was in a terrible neighborhood and the constant sounds of ambulances and police sirens made it a place of constant unease.

Still, one would think that with the ruin of the building that they were poor, but her dad managed to have the most up to date home theater system, could afford to order delivery every night for dinner from expensive restaurants, and had the most ridiculous and gaudy gold chains and Adidas track suits. He had when she was younger earned a mean scar across his face and another along his neck that made his speech come out like a wooden door creaking against its hinges. He had several teeth knocked out and replaced them with gold dentures, and had himself covered in tattoos announcing his loyalty to his race, his varying religious beliefs, and most importantly his hatred of immigrants and non-white people in general.

When she was younger she had asked her father to come to career day in the 2nd grade. He said, "I don't have to work, I had me a rich uncle and he left me a load of inheritance." When she asked what the uncle's name was so she can pray for him and thank him Harold said, "Shut your gob you little cunt. I ain't here for interrogation, what are you the flatfoot? Little Miss Gumshoe wants to back talk her old man!? Your lucky I keep you around what with your mother gone!" For a 2nd grader to hear this sort of talk, it was not supposed to be normal, but unfortunately she was already used to it. She just looked down, kept her eyes to the ground, sniffed back her tears, and waited for him to finish. If she were lucky he would just yell at her, if things got worse then he would hit her, she just had to wait and see. "Oh I see, crying like a little bitch then. Like I'm the bad guy! Your mother is the one that checked out early! She's the one that left you with me! Now I'm stuck raising an ungrateful brat!" This was one place she just couldn't let him go. "She didn't leave me! She died! She was in a car accident when I was a little baby and she died!" What followed was not a spanking, or a paddling. It was just a beating. Not for discipline or for training or even punishment, it was just rage. It was the kind of beating that left bruises, cuts, swollen eyes, loose teeth. She didn't ask him about family ever again. She told the teacher she fell down the stairs... again. The teacher didn't care... again.

Nowadays the habits formed at home transferred to her school life. Addison chose to be grey. She chose to be unnoticeable. She chose to make absolutely no waves and to blend in as best she could. She was, when she was occasionally noticed, accused of being a tom boy, a plain jane, and a nerd. Her secret outlet was through fantasy. She would consume books about strong women overcoming terrible adversity. She loved stories about dark evil forces, and a woman with courage and cunning overcoming brute strength and impossible odds. She loved reading stories about impossible men falling in love with these powerful women and yet the heroine making their affections a second priority to something far more important like family or saving the world. There was something wonderful about being able to enjoy the company of men, but not being ruled by them. These of course seemed like such far fetched fantasies though, when the headmaster of her school was a man and a tyrant, her father was a man and a tyrant, and the boys at school either choosing to sleep with you or ostracize you.

She would have preferred the company of women, but in her school it seemed she would have to wear pink every day, dress in ways that got uncomfortable glances from older male teachers, and spend all day gossiping. She eventual discovered gossiping was just another form of hating other women. Her options were to hate men, hate women, or hate herself. Being incapable of bringing herself to despise other people, she chose to hate herself. She hid herself away from the world behind her black hair falling in her face, her thick hoodie covering the bruises and cuts on her arms and wrists, and the headphones which screamed classic rock and pop-punk to drown out the hateful noises of the day, whether it was the gossip from the girls, the pressure from the boys, or her father pointing out her shortcomings again.

She sometimes lay awake at night thinking of the one thing that she was missing that would have thrown it all together. She needed mom. She needed someone to have her back. She needed someone to hold her and let her know it was all going to be okay. She needed someone to keep her father in check. She needed someone to stick up for her at school and teach her how to navigate this life as a proud and happy woman and not just a scared little girl.


	4. Loki is No Match Against Strong Females

After witnessing seven year old Addison be viciously beaten by the man who was supposed to be her father, Loki had seen enough. He would not allow himself to be kept from his God-Daughter any longer.

Loki paced the hallways of Fensalir, the great hall where Frigga received her half of the fallen heroes of battle. There was outside a clashing of steel and screams of rage and effort and pain. Suddenly a horn blew and everyone outside the hall began to cheer. The hallway doors burst open and what appeared to be millions of athletic men and women of every age, shape and size came pouring in to the massive structure. People were high fiving and patting one another on the back as disturbing wounds and slashes quickly faded from their bodies. One person's head was rotating from the back to the front as a pair of warriors helped twist it back into place. They all sat down in the hall in long rows of tables and the joyful chatter of the day expressing admiration for their training partner's courage and skill. It created a contagious atmosphere of positivity. These people had been literally killing eachother, and yet at the sound of a horn, they were comrades in arms once more.

Finally Frigga, queen of Fensalir, who was given first pick of the heroic slain stepped in from the fields in her own training regalia. She was in a short roman tunic and wielded a silver shield and a gladius. She stood slightly taller than all but the most gigantic men, and she was beaming with pride.

"Your hard work is paying off heroes! We'll show the Jotun a great thrashing when Ragnarok comes! I'm pleased to train alongside such worthy champions! And look! We have a guest! Everyone behold the great god Loki! While we fight with strategy and strength, Loki's gifts lie in cunning and charisma. They are most formidable weapons, but only when properly channeled. Think on that during tonight's feast, and be ready with some new cunning tricks or skillful alliances in our training session tomorrow children."

Loki kept his expression flat and kept his eyes glued to Frigga, "Mother, I have to speak with you about Addison."

"Loki, you made the rules yourself, you can only come when she calls for you."

"Yes mother, but her father threw away the card, and I have no way to speak to her otherwise to tell her."

A woman with fiery red hair and hard muscles in her exposed forearms and calves came forward with a stern look on her face. She was holding a kitchen knife in one hand and a meat tenderizer in the other that she gripped viciously. "Loki!" She barked. "What of my daughter?!"

Loki jumped at the sound and turned, "I'm trying Martha! I just don't know what to do! I can't go to her unless she calls me."

"Loki, your the gods-damned god of mischief and trickery. Find a loop hole. My daughter is not meant to suffer under that man." Martha replied.

Loki turned to Frigga who simply looked at him with a knowing smile. "I cannot offer you any hints, it would be against the rules, but Martha is right. It is your duty, and you are uniquely qualified to complete this task."

Martha bored a hole into Loki's heart with her stare as a quivering tear slide down her face, "Make it right Loki. Make it right." She pleaded, then turned her back and devoured a piece of chocolate cake that seemed to suspiciously appear exactly where she intended on sitting.

Loki turned back to Frigga, "Any other wonderful advice, mother?"

Frigga looked at him with great intent, hoping her message would get clear. "None of the gods, in any of the halls of Asgard can help you. Stop asking the gods."

Loki looked bewildered. "Fine then, I'll find a way myself." And he stormed off.


	5. Odin's Wolves Are Moon Moon

The night was dark, when a rat scurried across the floors of Valhalla. The pristine floors were barely lit by the glowing embers remaining from the roasting pit in the center of the hall. The smell of meat and desserts still lingered from the feast a few hours before. As the rodent approached the great throne at the end of the hall it paused and sniffed the air.

There was a low grumbling coming from two enormous black wolves that snored on either side of the throne. The rat carefully and silently weaved its way up the steps to the throne and found itself creeping slowly in between the two wolves inching towards the chair. The rat paused as it began to choose the best route to climb the seat itself.

It was then that it noticed a change in the atmosphere. The rumbling continued, but it stopped following the rhythm of steady breathing. The rat turned around and there were the two massive wolves staring with a low growl at the little creature. Bearing their teeth they were clearly not looking to make friends.

The rat suddenly began to grow. The black fur sunk inward to reveal green and gold cloth where it once was. The tail flattened out and spread into a cloak. The pointy ears thinned, elongated, and curled to form magnificent golden horns atop a golden helmet. Loki stood tall, but was only now face level with the massive wolves. They stared at him growling louder now, drool flowing from their vicious teeth. "Guys!" Loki said, "It's just me! Your old pal Loki!"

"BRARPH!" A deafening bark sent Loki's hair puffing back at the velocity of the breath of the thing.

Two guards standing outside the main door of Valhalla turned towards eachother to confirm if they heard a strange loud sound from inside. The woman and the man both placed their ear up to the door to listen carefully. There was a faint voice in the distance that was inaudible.

Eventually it grew louder and louder until they could make out the words and sounded to be accompanied by rapid foot steps.

"OhfuckohfuckohfuckohfuckOHFUCKOHFUCKOHFUCKOHFUCKOHFUCKOHFUCKOHFUCKOHFUCK!"

The doors slammed open and a tall man in a green helmet exploded through the entrance and tumbled out of the great hall. The two huge wolves burst through the door way barking viciously clearly chasing the man.

"FUCK! STAIRS!" Was the last thing the man shouted before he lost his balance and tumbled down the stairs leading up to the hall.

The dogs stopped at the top stairs and watched the man cascade down the stone steps for a few seconds. One of the hounds looked at the stairs and up at Loki, then tested the first stair with its paw. It turned its head a bit to the side and let out a soft squeaking sound. It looked to the other dog who kept walking at the steps and then backed up a bit trying to work out a method but was just as bewildered. It looked to Loki and let out a soft whimper and motioned to the stairs with its snout and looked back at Loki.

"You big mutts! You made it down the in side stairs just fine to rip my head off, but you're scared of the outside stairs? They are the same stairs! How are they any different?!" Loki berated the wolves.

The dogs just whimpered.

"Big doofus dogs!" Loki shouted.

"BRARRFFFF!" the dogs responded. Loki jumped back a bit, startled, regained his composure and straightened his coat. The dogs trotted back inside.

After the commotion and noise of the dogs had stopped there was a deep hardy laughter that could barely be heard far in the distance.

"Shut the FUCK up, Heimdall!" Shouted Loki.

Muttering to himself Loki said while dusting himself of, "Okay... no hijacking the all-seeing throne-o-vision for answers... time for plan B..."


	6. Don't Do Drugs, Mmkay?

**A/N Wow! He must really love you guys! 6 chapters to be uploaded today. Keep on showing the love!**

Addison woke with a start. She had a dream she couldn't shake, but couldn't quite remember. All she could recall was the taste of blood, and someone shouting, "you bitch!" She couldn't bring to mind if it were her blood in the dream or someone else's. All she knew was that someone was hurt very badly.

She turned to look at the clock, the time was 3:33 in the morning. It was still dark out. Addison tossed and turned and attempted to fall back asleep, but eventually she realized that she was too rattled. She instantly regretted getting to bed so late the night before. She made the mistake of giving herself a small treat by sneaking some chocolate cake and reading since it was her half-birthday. In 6 months she would be turning 16.

She pulled on a pair of gym shorts and her slippers and headed down the stairs to the kitchen to make some coffee. As she crept down the stairs she heard something that made her freeze on the spot. Harold was still awake.

He was standing in the kitchen cussing at some small object with his back to the stairs. She watched him silently trying to make sure she knew what he was doing. Just then, he shouted an exclamation. The suddenness made Addison jump which caused one of the stairs to creek. Harold whipped around to look towards the noise. He stared directly where Addison was standing his eyes lit with anger, his pupils dilated.

Addison repeated over and over again in her head, "please don't see me, please don't see me." Harold began glancing around on either side of her, then stood up and began moving to the stairs. "Please don't see me, please don't see me." He walked up to the first step and peered directly up the stairs but seemed unphased by anything. He was close enough now that Addy could see what was in his hands. It was a hypodermic needle, and a spoon.

Addison wasn't sure exactly what she was looking at, but she'd seen enough movies to know that this definitely wasn't something you'd use to treat a head cold... or a case of the lumbering abusive psychopaths.

Harold turned back to the kitchen and began fumbling around. There was a clicking sound like someone failing to light a lighter a few times, then there was soft noises of motion, then Harold let out a long sigh and within a few minutes was snoring softly. Addison crept back up the stairs and counted her lucky stars that Harold appeared to be too high or too strung out to properly see in the darkness of the night.


	7. I'm Not Crying, You're Crying

Martha had a hard time sleeping after witnessing the beating her poor 7 year old daughter had endured. After throwing her rage at Loki she set herself on the task of finding her own way back to Midgard, to home, so that she could protect her daughter.

Frigga had called a special announcement to all in Fensalir. Training was to be put on hold for the day. It would be a day of feasting and merriment in honor of the Goddess Freya.

When Martha entered the hall she saw true power. Frigga was grace and confidence and endless knowledge, but Freya... Freya was something else entirely. She wore plain but polished silver armor that covered her entire torso but left her arms free. She wore a dark amber skirt that spilled out from underneath her armor that was hidden behind a dress of chainmail, and she wore a silver bracelet around her wrist that matched those of two body guards that stood on either side of them. She wore a proud but unadorned silver helmet that resembled a panther or large cat of some kind, and she wore a dark brown cloak that, when looked at up close appeared to be made of falcon feathers.

The two guards had similar armor and dress, but one was a ballerina thin redhead with pale skin and rippled across her skin were freckles that served only to draw your focus to the contrasting bright blue eyes. The other had midnight black skin and her body was curved in a manner that was almost an exaggeration of the female form with her enormous heavy chest and her impossibly wide hips and thin waist. What was clear though, was that both of these women were incredibly dangerous. They made Martha's own fierce musculature appear to be adolescent and ameteurish despite the constant training the Martha endured fighting day in and day out.

Frigga, once it was clear everyone had settled into their seats at the banquet chair stood and rose her glass. Her sheer presence and charisma was enough to silence the room as everyone else stood and raised their glasses.

"For those of you keeping count, it has been 9 years since our last champion has risen from our ranks to join the highest calling a mortal can achieve. If you died within the last 9 years and haven't heard already, then a small overview would be in order. I leave this up to Freya as she is the expert in these matters." Frigga's sing-songy voice would have seemed annoying or even comical if it wasn't laced with such authority and presence. It was clear that she knew just as much as Freya did regarding what was to come, but held back her knowledge. Martha remembered that Frigga held knowledge back from Loki as well regarding his task, though her eyes then seemed to belie some secret she was trying to steer her adopted son to discover. This speech was no different. When she spoke, she did not wave her eyes over the crowd addressing them all. Instead she stared directly at Martha.

When her portion of the speech finished, she turned to the muscular, blonde, tanned goddess Freya and whispered something in her ear. Freya nodded expressionless and stood. Freya glanced around the room, her eyes bright and shining through the shadow of her helmet. When she spoke, her voice was dark and echoing and sultry. "Honored dead, if you look about you, you'll see that there are no men in this room." Martha glanced around surprised she didn't notice at first. "They have been invited to Thor's dining hall for what they think is a special men's only ceremony. They will be gifted with medals for valor and strength and praised for their hard work. Some may be granted armors and weapons or other gifts if they have been deemed worthy. You women are the real purpose of this meeting however, and what we discuss is to be of the utmost secret. You must not discuss it past these walls. Just as you would keep a lover's secret needs private before his or her friends, you must keep this secret as well."

She continued, "My Valkyrie are not some ancient race of angels. They are you. The women who have fallen in battle with courage. The best and strongest of the honored dead are chosen to join my ranks. With this boon there comes great pain as well. Your task is to find good worthy men and women, watch them as they breathe their last, and bring them to Odin and Frigga so that they may chose which ones are to be in Valhalla, and which ones are to be sent her to Fensalir."

"Then once, every nine years, the best nine warrior women of Fensalir are allowed to join the ranks of the Valkyrie. A Valkyrie is gifted wings which allow her to fly between the nine realms, and she is able to visit their home realm once before their training is begun for a length of my choosing and to perform a single task with my approval. Most of you will want to say goodbye to your loved ones and to tell them of the afterlife, others may want to avenge their death or explain their death to their loved ones if they know they died under mysterious circumstances. All of this is allowed, but should you speak to a loved one be sure to remind them that no one will believe a word they say. Once your task is complete you are to return to me for training of the sort that only the queen of the Valkyries can give."

"Some of you may be wondering why it is that only females can be Valkyrie and the answer is far more simple than you might think. You women have always been Valkyrie. From the first time you saw something big and strong and masculine suffer and wanted to nurture it, you were initiated in your heart. We are the greatest mercy to males. When a little boy is sick and crying, it is mother who picks him up and carries him to the healer to ease his pain. So to is it for us, when a true warrior is wounded and dying in battle, he becomes that little child again, crying for a mother he doesn't know he has or needs. He sits in fear not of dying, but of what comes after. He wishes upon all hope that there will be an angel to guide him to his home, and you are that angel. You will appear at the moment of his death, and lift him in your arms. Like a mother carrying her son to bed when he shivers with fever, you will carry good, honorable, brave men to their bed in Valhalla and let them know that there is joy after death. That they are not alone. When they see in the sky your valiant wings floating towards them, they know that Mom is coming and everything will be alright."

Martha couldn't take her eyes off of Freya, and a single tear fell down her cheek. Freya looked directly at Martha and said, "Those of you who wish to have a chance at this who are not selected today will have the next 9 years to train harder than their comrades and earn this right."

Martha whispered an echo of the speech in her mind and then said aloud, "Mom is coming, and everything will be alright."

The rest of the feast was a blur. The 9 candidates of this year were chosen, each of them undisputedly high among the ranks of victor's on the training ground. Some had been there for centuries, 2 had died just weeks before, but had been true warriors in life and were already among the most dangerous warriors in the room when they arrived. Martha knew right away that she was not prepared to be a Valkyrie. She had 9 years to change that. Addison would have to suffer for 9 years if Loki could not get to her sooner. But she had 9 years to prepare and train, and little Addison would be able to see her mother on her 16th birthday.


	8. Loki Takes One For The Team

Loki made his way to Heimdall at the steps of bifrost.

Heimdall stood tall and firm. His face expressionless and devout. He was a pinnacle of discipline and chastity.

Loki walked right past him, "Peeping tom..."

Heimdall did not react, and instead continued staring deep in though at the great void of space that spanned out across the great rainbow bridge.

"I'm off to the Norns, since it's clear none of the gods will help, I'm stuck bargaining with the old Crones, but of course you already know that you stalwart voyeur..." Loki said.

"I'll help you!" Said Heimdall.

"Really?" replied Loki.

"Sure!" said Heimdall, "I'll help you get to the Norns... ya big pervy rat!"

Loki went red hot, "Now you listen hear you binge watching mother fu-"

Heimdall shoved Loki through the portal and the force of Heimdall's godlike strength sent him flying into the side of an enormous wooden wall. Loki thought the world was spinning for a moment but instead he realized he was just falling... realllllly far. "Not this again..."

After what seemed like forever but was really just about 30 minutes (yep, blatant rip off moment) Loki plunged into a glowing blue pond with cobblestone walls. Everything was pure and serene, but at the bottom of the water was a single blue eye. Loki shivered at the gruesome sight and then splashed to the surface. He crawled up the nearest wall and scrambled over it like a cat desperately escaping a bathtub. His slick grip threw off his traction and he ended up tumbling into the dirt on the other side of the short cobblestone wall. At the top of the wall there was a head. A human head. It seemed to be looking directly at him, and as Loki rose to his feet he realized it was keeping eye contact. Then the damned thing spoke!

"You uh... didn't swallow any of that water did ya?" Said the head.

"Goodness no! There's a god-damned eye down there! I could only dream of what infections one could contract mortal or not!" Replied Loki.

"Oh good... just uh... don't tell anyone about this, I'm not supposed to let anyone near the water without payment." Said the head.

"Mkayyyy..." said Loki, "good luck selling Eyes-water." The head blinked, "... get it? Eyyyyes water? Like Ice wa- you know what? Never mind..." Loki bounded off towards the wall he hit earlier and followed it.

After what seemed like an hour he came across a hole in the wall, like a natural formed cave. He walked in and paused to let his eyes adjust to the dark.

There was a gentle homely sweetness in the air in the cave that had hints of vanilla and brown sugar. He made his way to the end of the cave which opened up into a very cozy little room. There were three ladies sitting in matching rocking lazyboy style recliners. The first was a preteen chewing gum and texting furiously on her phone. She had a sort of gypsy air about her, dark mocha skin but bright blue eyes. The second was a startlingly beautiful woman in a long green dress with the same coloration of the younger girl except where the girl's hair was shaved along the right side and left hanging over her face a little bit on the left, the woman's hair was long and flowing and fell to her back. The woman was efficiently working something on a small laptop computer and seemed to enjoy her work. The last was an older lady bent over a pair of knitting needles piecing together a squared section of a quilt.

The young girl stopped and turned to the woman and said, "Oh my god, you wouldn't believe what happened, so like a few years ago, there was this chick Tracy, total prude by the way, she named her kid Macy. Like that is so tacky."

The woman chimed in, "If you think that's bad, that little girl is now seven and just made friends with a girl named Lacy."

The old lady piped up, "Slut... I bet she gets the herp-a-derps..."

The girl and the woman stopped and turned to the old lady, and begin cracking up.

Loki knocked gently on the wall of the cave to announce his presence.

"Uncle Loki!" chirped the little girl. She bounded out of her chair and dropped her phone and ran to Loki and gave him a big hug.

"Urd! There's my favorite little historian! What news from Midgard?" Loki returned the hug and smiled.

Urd fired off as fast as her young sounding voice could speak, "Oh my god, um, like, so, there was this Hitler guy who sucked and tooootally misappropriated our runes for like some racisty stuff and so now the swastika is a hate symbol on earth, like banned in schools and stuff, then there was this middle eastern dude, Jesus or something who was cool and all about helping the poor and stuff but was totally misunderstood and now everyone uses him to get rich and stuff, and there's this um... OH! Gramma says we're going to get a movie with some really fancy British guy playing you and he's gonna look exactly like you and be super dreamy!"

Loki raised his eyebrows. Urd flushed, "No that I think you're super dreamy or... I mean not that your not super dreamy... but like... oh my! Gotta text! Sure do need to read this and go away now!" Urd turned around wide eyed and went back to her chair and buried her face under a blanket.

Loki nodded politely to the other two ladies, "Skuld" he said to the oldest, "Verdandi" he turned to the woman.

The woman pretended not to stifle a laugh and glanced up at Loki. "So what are you here for?"

"Well I made a sort of mistake with a magical contract. Sort of an If, Than situation. I set it up so that she could call me and I would appear, but she doesn't know she can call me, and she has literally no one else in the 9 worlds but her Einherjar mother." Loki replied.

"I'm not interested in the past Loki, just tell me what you need now."

"I need to go to Midgard and help my God-Daughter, but I can't go unless she asks me to."

"Well that seems simple, if you give up your magic then you wouldn't be bound by magical law," replied Verdandi.

"How could I help her if I have no magic?" said Loki.

The old woman looked up now, "You would not loose your cunning or your knowledge, those were yours by natural law, not magical. You would just lose your Jotun strength, and your magic. Heimdall could still send you to midgard... if you choose that path." Said Skuld.

"Must it always be like this with you? If I want something I have to trade something?" Said Loki.

"Only a fair trade. To save a God-Daughter in exchange for your magic? This is a fair deal." Said the woman Verdandi.

"Fair trade?!" said Loki, "Is there no other way?"

The old maid Skuld looked up, "There could be a darker path ahead of you. You could choose to only give up the magic temporarily, but you would owe us."

Loki smiled venomously, "Oh? And what would I owe you?"

The ladies all shared a look and nodded in agreement, "Our niece is lonely and could use... company..."

Loki's smile dropped, "A dark path indeed... Angrboda? She's so... clingy!"

Skuld nodded. "Nine years. You will be her companion for nine years and we will grant you temporary reprieve from the burdens of your magics. Believe me when I say, you will be needed most... at the exact moment of your arrival, should you walk this path."

Loki gulped.

The trio went back to their tasks, and a Rainbow appeared underneath Loki's feet. The world around him shimmered and he was standing back in Asgard face to face with Heimdall.

Heimdall's normal stoic demeaner was completely lost, he walked up to Loki and gave him a big giant hug held him at arms length by his shoulders, looked right at him and said, "Dude... Angrboda?"

"Yyyyep..." Loki replied.

Heimdall removed his helmet and bowed his head, suddenly literally every male god appeared around them slowly fading into existence and all at once started humming a funeral march song with their hats, helmets, or hands over there hearts while Thor stood in the front of them "Let it be known that on this day, Loki of Asgard jumped on the most historical grenade of all of mythology! May his man-card forever be instated and me he always be remembered as a solid dude!"

Loki glared at Thor. Then at Heimdall. Then at literally every god in the vicinity and shouted, "OH MY GODS FUCK YOU ALL!"

And the entire crowds burst into hysterical laughter some falling to the ground.

"Heimdall you fucker! You need to keep your gods damned mouth shut! I don't want to bang her, but Martha will tie my nuts to a rampaging goat if I don't!"

Thor's laughter went from jolly to screaming uncontrollable laugter, "I FORGOT ABOUT THAT GOAT! HAAAAAAHAHAHAHAA!"


	9. The Try Not To Cringe Challenge

Addison couldn't sleep the rest of the night. She readied herself for school and headed down to the kitchen. She noticed that Harold wasn't wearing the god-awful gold chain around his neck, a slight improvement she thought. He was still passed out with the needle hanging out of his arm. She pretended not to notice, and headed to the fridge to grab something for breakfast and lunch.

"Great..." she muttered as she found it only contained a half drunk bottle of beer and some mayonnaise. She checked the pantry and found an almost empty box of cereal. She poured its contents into a zip-lock style plastic bag and headed out the door.

As soon as she opened the door she knew something was wrong. There was a large box truck parked in front of her home. There was nothing written on the side, just an unmarked white moving truck of sorts. She looked at the men leaning against the truck and knew from some darkened instinct that they were all like her dad. Cruel and quick to anger, and ruthless. They didn't sport the same tattoos or lack of fashion sense, instead they were clean, dressed in nondescript clothing, and while not clean shaven, at least well taken care of. One of them was smaller and skinny for a man, about her size, and he kept one hand in his pocket playing with something hidden inside. The largest man stepped forward. He was a hulk of a man, fat but not weak. Clearly a man who like his pizza and beer, but also spent some time at the gym... or prison yard... lifting heavy things.

"Ello miss, we've got some business with your father, is he in?" asked the man. He sounded like Jason Statham.

"He's asleep right now... I have to go to school," Replied Addison.

"I've seen you around here, you go to school with my Johnny. He's talked about you. Maybe you know him? Johnny Rattan? I'm Little Joey Rattan. Tell Johnny I say hi would ya?"

"Sure... Goodbye..."

The skinny one stepped forward now, "If you're a friend o'Johnny's, I could give you a ride." He didn't seem to imply anything by the wording but he still smiled and winked, as if even when he were being sincere, he was still being disgusting. The thought of her straddling the man flashed through her head without her conjuring it. She had to hold down a small gagging reflex picturing his bony frame wriggling underneath her, all hip bones and knees and elbows.

"No thanks, I need the exercise," Addison replied. She thought she should just play it as if they were her father. Show no sense of anger or repulsion, just get as much space as politely as possible.

Addison began walking and realized about half a block away that she had been too startled to lock the door. She turned and the men were already inside.

By the time she made it to school she went straight to the library. She pulled last years yearbook and went to the R's. Sure enough there he was, Johnny Rattan. Fat, pasty, and of course he was wearing what he thought to be a very classy top hat of sorts. The fedora seemed to be the uniform of "nice guys" in her school. Now that she had a name to a face she realized that she recognized him from math and biology, and from the lunch room.

"Just great..."

She headed to class, first period was english and they were reading the Count of Monte Cristo. They had just gotten to the part where Mercedes breaks up with Count Mondego. As she is walking away Mondego the coward shoots her in the back. She thinks to herself, "Even the most beautiful wealthy women in the world has to deal with the calamity of men insisting on holding ownership over her."

Next period was math, it seemed uneventful at first, she got her favorite seat in the back corner farthest from the teacher. After a minute into the teacher's lesson a cell phone rings and a big sturdy boy gets up and walks to the hallway. The teacher doesn't bat an eye and just continues drawing cylinders and rectangular prisms on the board. The boy comes back into the classroom and walks straight back to her. He stands next to her and holds out his hand. Not sure what he is expecting she holds out hers too, thinking it to be the polite thing. "Perhaps a handshake? Awkward high five? No no... not this..."

The boy makes a big sweeping bow motion, too big for the strange ill fitting fedora on his head, and kisses her hand. As he does the fedora tumbles to the floor and with great effort and heavy breathing he manages to just barely get to one knee, pick up the hat, and using her desk stand himself back up. Everyone is staring wide eyed at this soft round boy and his sudden display of... courage?

"Hello m'lady, *heavy breathing* name is Johnny Rattan, and my father is *huff, huff* Joey Rattan. Sorry, out of breath, and he says that your dad is in his pocket for some debt, family business. In any event, he let me know that you were an exceptionally wonderful human being of the female persuasion, and while I usually only consider nines and tens I feel like you might be worth it for me to lower my physical standards a bit since you aren't a total bitch. In any event, my dad can be really dangerous, and if you were my girlfriend then he wouldn't touch you, so I can be your *huffing and puffing again* body guard, sort of like a guardian angel, but more dapper."

Addison stared, jaw agape much like the rest of her class. Just then a buzzing from her phone interrupted the moment. Thankful for the excuse to pause this situation, she held up a finger and pulled out her phone.

TEXT MESSAGE: DAD

"Great..." she thought, then unlocked the phone.

"Be nice to that Johnny kid, we owe his dad some money and we want to keep on his good side. Also, use your allowance to buy some food, you ate the rest of my cereal. And it stinks, clean up a bit would ya?"

"Oh jesus..." she murmered to herself.

"This deal isn't going to be here for *huff huff* ever..." said the rotund boy.

"Umm..." quickly thinking, at least she can get some food out of this nightmare, "Dinner?"

"Okay, but we're splitting the tab, I'm a feminist and all about equality. I know how to treat a lady like an equal. I won't even expect you to put out 'cause I'm not your average guy. I'm not just some Chad who wants to get into your pants."

"Fuck..." she accidentally said allowed, thinking about how to get food for her and her dad on her last $20.00.

"Unless you want to? I'll make up for what I lack in experience with enthusiasm!"

"NO! No... umm... I think that's.. really sweet that you want to take it... really... reallllllly slowly."

The boy sat down back in his seat after much effort. Jacey, Macy, and Lacy all giggled. The boy sitting next to her mouthed to her, "I'm SO sorry!" The teacher finished drawing a pentagram, erased it, then drew a pentagon. Turned around and began droning about angles or something.


	10. Stupid Sexy Flanders

Every day, when the warriors of Valhalla and Fensilar awaken, they take a hardy breakfast, don their armor and shields, grab their weapons of choice and head into the training fields. They train until lunch. At Fensilar they practice marching together, basic attacks, and mixed unit tactics. They learned to work with their archers and calvary to move around their lines like water, or when to spot a weakness in the enemy's lines and crash against in like waves.

In Valhalla, they spent their mornings in dueling practice becoming more skilled individual fighters, and conditioning their bodies with weighted weapons and wearing restrictive and heavy armor. Then in the afternoons they houses would each split into groups fight to the death or until the great horn blows sounding the end of training. They take dinner and spend their evenings enjoying eachother's company.

The secret to how this is fun rather than miserable, is nothing to do with the work, and everything to do with the people. Only good, kind, honorable warriors are allowed into Valhalla and Fensilar. Valhalla tends to get the Hercules and Achilles types, were as Fensilar gets the Athena and Julius Caesar types. Once a year Valhalla and Fensilar test their might against each-other. What happens is absolutely amazing.

Valhalla wins every single individual test. Strength, dueling, wrestling, archery, even engineering and foot races. Fensilar on the other hand always wins the big final skirmish at the end of the day. Pound for pound each individual Valhalla warrior is a stronger and more skilled opponent, but Fensilar dominates in the fields of strategy and cooperation. Teamwork in terms of combat almost always makes the whole greater than the sum of its parts.

This year was no different. Martha watched as her brothers and sisters were picked apart by stronger, more skilled opponents, people who clearly trained harder and wanted it more. But then she watched in awe as her cadre, which had spent more time drilling field movements than individual combat skills out maneuvered, flanked, and crushed their opponents.

At the end of the battle, after awards were passed out for individual acts of courage, skill, or strategy, a ceremony that had been enacted for centuries began.

Odin stood at the head of his soldiers and said in a booming voice, "Surely my wife, your army is skilled and ready for Ragnarok! I am certain my soldiers all agree that there is no advice we could give you to improve upon what is already perfect!" Odin turned to his soldiers and they all stayed still and silent.

It was Frigga's turn to repeat back the congratulatory call. "Surely my husband, your soldiers are skilled and ready for Ragnarok! I am certain my army agrees that there is no advice we could give you to improve upon what is already perfect!" Frigga turned to see her army standing silent and still. Just as she turned a small figure stepped forward. Still too fresh to have earned armor or weapons, she still carried the weapons she died holding, and the clothes she died wearing. She held a small shiny meat tenderizer high in her right hand. Sunlight glinted off of the hammer and flashed across Frigga's eyes.

Odin looked around, a bit bewildered and leaned towards Frigga whispering, "what do I do?"

Frigga walked over and whispered into his ear.

Odin stood tall and proud and in his booming voice said, "What? Umm... Whad'ya want... there... you little soldierino?"

Frigga frowned at him. Odin smiled and shrugged, "what? you said just go with it!"

"Um... Your godliness..." started Martha.

"PLEASE! Call me Odin. I insist. No need for formalities on the ol' field of battle... training... battle training!"

Poorly trying to mask her lilting soft Irish accent, Martha went on. "Well, Odin, sir... We could maybe... do like a foreign exchange program. We could send some folk to train in the Valhalla style, and you could send some people to Fensilar? You know, to see how we drill our battle formations and such?"

Frigga turned to Odin and said, "See? I told ya you'd like her!"

Odin laughed a big hearty laugh, "Splendid! Cross training! Yes! I train heroes, she trains armies... imagine, a disciplined ARMY of HEROES! God of wisdom indeed! Give me a few like her and we'll conquer the nine realms... s'more..."

Frigga smiled and said, "Since it was your idea, you'll be the first to go. Well done Martha!"


	11. We're All Heimdall At This Point

Loki stood outside the strangely cute house. He dreaded knocking on the door, but his duty was to save his God-Daughter from her father lest he fail in literally the only responsibility he had taken up in centuries.

He slowly raised his hand to knock on the door. Hesitating he closed his eyes, took a breath, and instantly the door swung open.

"LOKIIIIII!" The giant poodle said as it nudged the door open.

The giant white poodle with perfectly white curls and a pink bow in its hair tackled Loki and began licking his head. Not his face mind you, this thing is huge, it just licked his whole head.

"OH MY GODS I'M SO HAPPY TO SEE YOU! IT'S BEEN SO LONG! DO YOU HAVE ANY TREATS FOR ME? I DON'T SMELL ANY TREATS... THAT'S OKAY OH MY GODS THANKS FOR STOPPING BY! CAN WE GO FOR A WALK? WALK WALK WALK WALK WALK?!"

"I'm afraid you'll have to let me stand if we are to walk..." Replied Loki.

Angrboda instantly went silent and sat on her hind legs and remained the perfect picture of obedience while it panted and wagged its tail. It managed to hold on to this demeanor for an impressive 8 seconds before it looked sideways at Loki and then forward and then spoke "quietly" out of the side if its mouth, "Walk?"

"Yes Angrboda... we can go for a walk..."

"Dog or people?" said the poodle from inside the house already retrieving a leash.

"What?"

"You want me to walk like a dog or a people?"

"You can do people?"

"Yap!"

"Let's try that then!"

"Okay!"

A stunning and fiercely athletic young woman with tightly curled and bobby pinned snow white hair ran out of the house completely nude with only a leash around her neck.

"OH JESUS DOG! DOG!" Cried Loki suddenly adjusting his trousers.

"Not ready for the people thing yet? I thought giant poodle would be wierder than human woman... but I guess furries are a thing now..." Asked Angrboda now back in human form.

"I am NOT a fu..." Loki started but then cocked his head to the side as if he could hear something in the distance.

"OH MY GOD SHUT UP HEIMDALL!"


	12. iM nOT a FeMinIsT i bELiEVe iN EQuALiTy

Addison stood outside her door waiting patiently. Her father insisted she wear the one dress that she owns. It was a little small since it was bought a year ago and she'd grown since then, and so the top cut into the fat under her arms. It squeezed her chest more than it should have and left her feeling a bit exposed. She didn't want to look like she had any genuine interest in this kid, but this dress and her "do-me" heels were bound to give the wrong impression. Still though, the weather was at least warm so she could avoid any unnecessary "here, wear my coat!" moments. She began to contemplate that perhaps she was just putting too much thought into the circumstances. Perhaps she could just try to enjoy the night for what it was? Her dress was very pretty after all, and she had few excuses to wear it. It was a simple but formal black number that had a corset style top and at the hips turned into a slightly foofy puff of sheer layers of black fabric with little flecks of silver. It didn't poof out very far, just enough to make her still feel a little like a princess, but still sensible enough that girl in her teens wouldn't be seen as childish or tasteless. She thought that maybe for one night, in her pretty little dress in a nice restaurant she could possibly just let herself be seen. Perhaps everything wouldn't be so terrible.

"Oi! Addy!" called her father.

"Yes?" she replied, not trying to sound irritated.

"Don't bring yer mum's bracelet, you're liable to get mugged!" replied the man.

Addison didn't feel right leaving the gold bracelet behind, but couldn't think of a response to his small rare outburst of fatherly concern. She took the bracelet off just and handed it to him through the door just as a vehicle pulled in behind her. As she turned around she was a bit disappointed to see the box truck from before. "Gonna be a tight fit if we're riding in that thing..." she thought trying not to snicker about the boy's size. The door swung open and with almost cartoonish clumsiness the boy fumbled his way out of the seat, and climbing down the few ladder-like steps that folded out from the side of the vehicle. He carried a couple of red roses, but through his awkward climbing managed to bend one of them in half and knocked the head completely off of the other one. As he stretched out a leg with the toe of his dress shoe poking around trying to find the ground, his portly frame became too elongated for his short but wide pants and his butt crack momentarily assaulted Addison's vision. She turned away pretending not to have noticed holding her forehead trying to block her face from anyone who might be watching.

After another ten or fifteen seconds had passed Addison realized that she still had not heard anything and warily turned around wondering if she was supposed to greet him. Instead she saw that he was only done with phase two of his dismount. His foot had become caught between two of the rungs of the ladder and he lacked the balance to extricate one foot without falling over the other. Eventually he managed to twist himself so that his back was facing the ladder and he slipped his foot out leaving the shoe behind. To catch his momentum his now shoe-less sock plunged into the gutter before him and he limped around back to the truck and grabbed his shoe. He slipped it on and bent over to tie it and as he did, of course, his damn fedora fell off.

Addison stared wide-eyed wondering how a human like this managed to survive in the world past infancy, and how his muscular and dangerous father managed to produce such a soft and incapable offspring.

"Go get'em tiger!" said Joey to Johnny as he rounded the vehicle. "Love them heels," said Joey to Addison.

"Yeah... thanks..." she replied.

Joey walked past them directly into the house, already pulling a bag of a white substance out of his pocket before letting himself in.

"So... are you driving then?" asked Addison.

"Oh no, ain't got my license yet. We'll walk." Replied Johnny.

Addison hid her dissatisfaction. These shoes were not made for walking and the closest restaurant hub was about 6 blocks away. As Johnny already seemed out of breath, she wondered how they could ever make it to whatever he had in mind.

"I like your shoes!" Said Johnny. "You should wear them to school! They make your gams pop!"

"Did he just say "gams"?" Addison thought to herself. "This guy is so stereotypical and buffoonish it almost doesn't seem real, but sure enough, here I am. On a date with him..."

"I was just kidding what I said earlier. I'm all for equality, but I'm not a feminist. You didn't laugh so I didn't think you got my joke. Really I'm more of a family oriented kind of guy. I want like a bunch of kids, all boys though, girls are too dramatic. I think that if I have any girls I'll just ignore them and let my wife deal with them. I'll just beat up their boyfriends though if they get rough. I'm kind of like a protector for women you know? Not like a white knight or anything, those guys just pretend to be cool to get laid. I'm the real deal, I got a katana and everything just in case I need to stop a rapist if I see one near my house. The problem is I'm just too nice to girls. Like I'm too good of a guy, and nice guys finish last so all the girls I try to date end up going for assholes and jerks. It's kind of cool that your dad owes my dad money for the stuff my dad sells or else we'd never get to meet. Now you get to see the real me instead of the dapper facade I show the world. I'm the nicest guy you'd ever meet, but I have a dark side too. That's why I have a katana, because I have a samurai spirit, I love chivalry and bushido and stuff." Rambled the boy.

"Cool... so do you do like... Karate or something?" Addison replied wondering just how much a woman could tolerate because she "didn't want to be rude."

"Oh no, I don't need lessons, once you have the sword you are already more dangerous than anyone who doesn't have the sword. Besides all that training stuff is for jocks and meat heads. If you have superior intelligence you can beat them up with your mind instead of your muscle. Dad tells me I should work out more but I just tell him he should think more and not waste his time in the basement with his weights. He told me I wouldn't be able to get a girl without putting in some effort, but I already got you so that goes to show I'm just superiorly better than he thinks I am."

"Right... well... just to be clear, we're just going on a date, I haven't agreed to go steady or anything..."

"Yet! But you can probably already tell I'm not like other boys! I'll treat you like a queen and give you massages and flowers every day. Other guys will just cheat on you and abuse you and stuff, they are just for fun but I'm marriage material. Those guys are all just boys, but I'm a man. That's the difference between me and them. You can tell by how we dress. Boys have swag, but real men have class!" responded the boy motioning to his hat.

"Okay yeah... um... where are we going by the way?"

"Shake shack! Most guys would want to impress you by taking you somewhere fancy, but I know that your dad is out of all of the gold he got so he doesn't have much money. Since we're splitting the tab I decided we'd go somewhere cheap so you wouldn't have to spend too much. That's why I'm different than most guys, I think about your nee..."

"Wait... what do you mean gold?" Addison interrupted.

"Yeah, he said his ex wife left him with a bunch of gold, and he's been living off of it for a while but then he pawned his last bit of it to my dad a couple of weeks ago for the stuff my dad sells. He took a loan from my dad so he could get more stuff cause my dad says once you have a little you need more and more. He told my dad he could give him more gold tonight to pay back some of what he borrowed, that he found some more, but my dad says it won't be enough and he's going to have to get a job or find some other way to pay." Responded the child in adolescent's clothing.

"Wait.. he found more go... my fucking bracelet!" Addison started sprinting back towards the house, just then her high heel snapped on the pavement and sent her tumbling. Johnny gawked as her skirt flew up to give him a peak at the pair of shorts she very wisely wore underneath. She screamed and ripped off her stupid shoes, to run to the stupid house, to stop the stupid man from selling the one last thing she had from her mother. By the time she rounded the corner to the street to her house the box truck was already gone. Her shoulders sunk. She held her only nice pair of shoes in her hands and slowly walked to the house, the door was already opened and he dad was sitting unconcious on the couch with a needle in his arm. She screamed at the man and punched him and slapped him and shook him, but he wouldn't awaken. His chest still rose and fell with his breath, but he was completely passed out.

Johnny appeared in the doorway and saw her clearly upset. He walked up to her and hugged her. She didn't need Johnny right now, but she needed to be held, and so she sobbed into his chest all the same. She thought for just a moment that maybe there was a good person hidden somewhere behind this selfish ignorant child. Then his fingers started digging their way down the top of her dress.

"What the FUCK are you doing?!" Screamed Addison as she pushed herself away from him.

"We were having a moment!" Shouted Johnny.

"Jesus Christ Johnny! I'm not interested! You're not my type! You're not anyone's type! Holy shit this is so wrong! My Dad is using me to get in good with his fucking drug dealer and you're just fine with it so long as you get down my shirt? Are you fucking kidding me? Get the fuck out of my house Johnny! Get the fuck out or I'm calling the police!"

"You're breaking up with me?" Squeaked Johnny.

"No! We were never together! There's nothing to break! I'm sick of being polite! Just leave me the fuck alone!"

"You're gonna be mine again! You'll see! I'm the best you're ever going to get! No one loves you! Your own dad doesn't even give a fuck about you! You're a worthless, useless cunt! You should just kill yourself already you rancid swine! You whores are all the same! Don't ever talk to me again, you're not worth my time you bitch!" Shouted the "nice guy" as he stormed out of the house.

Addison wanted to just pass his comments off as meaningless insults, but he was in some small way right. Not even the person who was obligated to love her really cared about her. If she couldn't win over her own father then how could she be worthy of anyone? Maybe Johnny was her only shot at having someone, even if they were horrible, have a vested interest in her existence. Now she blew even that. Even her last piece of her mother was gone, stolen to sate an addicts ambitions. She felt like dying. Even the porcine boy had told her she should just kill herself. When she could be so easily tossed aside by someone that low on the food chain, then what worth did she even have? Maybe she should just die. But for now all she wanted to do was cry. She just wanted to lie down and mourn her mother, and sleep. She made her way upstairs to her room and looked at herself in the mirror. The makeup she had spent so much time doing and redoing because no one had shown her how, was now smeared and running down her face. Her breast was almost exposed where his digging fingers tried to worm into the tight corset top, and sure enough the fabric had torn in that spot. Her heels clutched in her hand were broken. And worst yet, she felt naked without the gold bracelet she wears everywhere... wore everywhere... to remember her mom. Everything she had left was broken, and tomorrow was a god damned school day.


	13. Undeath by Chocolate

Martha woke for the first time in the halls of Valhalla. Instead of the bright and airy atmosphere of Fensilar, Valhalla was dark and woody. It was constructed to look like a massive viking longboat that had been flipped upside down. Breakfast at Fensilar was usually pastries and fruit and often was set around a mood of comfort and joy. Valhalla was filled with meats and dark green vegetables, crusty bread and huge slabs of cheese and butter. Instead of the food appearing, it was served by older strong looking men and women. It was explained to her these were the dead who were honorable and wanted to serve the gods in the after life, but did not desire to be fighters. They apparently stayed in the halls of other gods relavent to their trades. Leather workers stayed with Vidar, Weaponsmiths stayed with Tyr who had them apprenticed to dwarves, Cooks and food service personnel stayed with Thor who was constantly eating, Idunna housed the gardeners and farmers, Freyr housed the ranchers, herders, and breeders, Freya of course housed the Valkyrie, but also had a special love of bacon so she had the pig sty's and the butchers. Frigga had a special place for weavers and healers as well as honorable witches and druids who wished to have an afterlife rather than have their life essence recycled. Hunters stayed with Skadi, and scholars and wise men and rune casters stayed with Odin in a special library that he kept to himself. Merchants and administrators stayed in the city center and kept the bustle of Asgard moving forward in the day to day. Most folks chose to retire in their after life, just behind the walls in helheim lay a huge plot of land dedicated to the honorable dead, this was a place with food and drink for all and no work need be done, and there were small reflective pools of water in which ancestors could watch their descendants and in some times of great need, they could request permission from Hel to lend strength or omens to their descendants to help them in their perils. Inside the halls of helheim itself lay a place of sleep, where the souls of those who no longer wished to exist, and also the useless, cowardly, or dishonorable would sleep painlessly and slowly sink into the ground until their souls would be broken down into the purest life essence and be sent to the roots of the great tree Yggdrassil to be used for something that may be greater than their life amounted to. Finally in Hel's great hall itself, the truly evil and vile were buried to their heads with just their faces poking out to be used as cobblestones, and the ceiling is crawling with vipers that drip a constant steady flow of venom into the eyes of the damned. At the center of the hall is a huge table covered in delicious food in complete darkness, and a single chair that is bathed in sunlight but remains empty waiting for the husband of Hel to be doted upon and loved with the eternal devotion that only the beautiful, hideous, and ever sad death herself can provide.

As Martha sat down she had a plate set in front of her by a chubby middle aged woman with rosy cheeks and curly black and grey hair sticking out of the sides of a maids bonnet. She took the cast iron plate cover off and revealed a hardy steak, eggs cooked perfectly with a load of salt and pepper, a pile of cooked spinach with chunks of ham, two crunchy slabs of bacon and, much to her surprise a chocolate cupcake with pink perfectly swirled icing and shining dark red cherry on top. "I thought I'd sneak ya in something from the bakery, you look like the type who enjoys a wee bit of sweets." Said the maid with a wink. "M'name's Lilliana and you just call if you need anythin'."

"Thank you, that's very kind." Said Martha. "Are there no sweets in Valhalla?"

"Oh sure, but only for special occasions, Odin only allows meat and veg and a little fruit for his warriors, wants them to grow stronger. I figured your first night counts as a special occasion though," replied the bubbly older woman.

"You chose to be a servant in your afterlife?" asked Martha.

"I could've never been a warrior me'self, but me mother taught me duty and honor in all things, so I do me duty and it's a great honor, and I can retire anytime I like, so don't you think you're putting me out by asking me for a favor." Replied Lilliana.

"Well that makes sense, I must say I envy your discipline and devotion. To serve by choice seems a much more difficult obligation to accept than to train and eat and someday fight a big battle. One sounds like a vigorous adventure, the other seems like work and toil."

"War is for those who want to destroy something, toil is for those who want to create. Me? I create cake! What better pursuit in after-life could there be than that? Oh! Worth every drop of sweat I say. Would you want to have an afterlife without cake? No ma'am! We bake all the goods for Fensilar as well, Frigga just prefers to serve the food herself with her own magic. It takes her a tremendous amount of effort each day to summon the food from the kitchens, but she considers it part of her obligation to you as a good host. So when the food appears magically to suit your exact emotional needs at the time? That's toil of a mother who looks after her children never even asking for so much as a thank you!"

"Odin doesn't use his magic in the same way?"

"Odin doesn't have as much magic to spare! He's not all powerful you know. He's a rune-carver and a wise man. He can ask the primal spirits of nature to aid him in great times of need, and he can solve almost any quarrel or problem with his god-like wit, but his magic is rare and subtle. Consider Frigga to be a flame thrower, and Odin to be a well placed match. Both can do just as much damage if you know how to use them proper, but there is a sure difference."

"You've been most informative Lilliana, tell me, is there a way for a mortal to get back to earth?"

"Other than a memory wipe and reincarnation, or the boon of the valkyrie, the only way I know of is to wait for Ragnarok. When the big war comes we'll be sent all over the place to keep the Jotun back as long as possible. Even us cooks will be running the camps while you are on the fields. We all do our part!"

"Thank you so much, how can I ever repay you?"

"Eat the cupcake first! I want to see your face."

Martha took a bit from the cupcake and had to stifle a moan. "Thuss us SUUUUUHHH Gudh!" Martha managed to say with a full mouth trying to figure out how to take two bites at once.

"OOOOOooo I just LOVE it when someone appreciates my work! Back to serving up this rabble, ta'!"

After devouring her cupcake and gnawing on some bacon Martha was relieved to find that the warriors were given a 30 minute warm up walk before the real training began to digest their food.

After wandering the grassy field outside until a horn sounded, everyone gathered at the center of the field for instructions. Newcomers were placed in classes based on their preferred weapons of choice under weapons masters. They drilled basic strikes and blocks for an hour until they worked up a good sweat. They then moved to "conditioning" and "body hardening" classes which consisted of weight lifting (which Martha had NEVER done but found she absolutely loved) and allowing yourself to be struck with light sticks on the arms, legs, chest, stomach and back. When Martha was waiting her turn for her beating designed to build pain tolerance and strengthen the bones she saw that there were several lines each with a different type of weapon being used based on your level of hardness. The very last line only had 3 people in it. Two men and one woman traded places striking and allowing themselves to be hit, with long iron bars. Every strike had a "ting" sound accompanied by a hard exhale from the person being struck as they tried not to show any pain.

After the body hardening session was complete, they began sparring. Everyone was paired up with someone of similar size and relative skill levels, and they were watched carefully by weapons masters who provided advice and corrected techniques.

It seemed that everyone fought with their own unique style and weapons and the masters tried only to compliment and improve what already came naturally to each person. There was no rigorous doctrine or adherence to a style or marching orders or formations. Instead everyone was focused on perfecting their individual craft.

The lunch horn sounded across the yard and tired, bruised and some wounded or dead (from the sparring matches) hobbled or were carried to the hall. As they entered the hall their wounds closed, their bruises faded, and everyone spent the day whole heartidly boasting about their achievements and congratulating each other on their improvements. Some couples whisked off to the sleeping quarters to share a private moment before eating, and others sat at the table fork and knife in hand with a napkin stuffed down their shirt.

Much to her surprise Martha found it easy to converse with a young looking samurai man who had died hundreds of years ago and served as her weapons master. "So Martha, why did you choose a hammer and a knife? That seems like an unlikely combination, especially for a house wife."

"Um... well I didn't quite choose them, they were just what was on hand when I... well..."

"When you died?"

"Yes..."

"To enter Fensilar you must die in battle, and fight fiercely enough to impress the Valkyries. Were you a great warrior in your home land? Did you fight many battles?" Asked her teacher.

"No... I fought just the one battle... and it killed me," Replied Martha looking distant.

"Ohh! You must've have fought with true spirit to make it here then! You must be a NATURAL warrior! I'm excited to see your potential! A viking fellow told me that you might want to be a Valkyrie yourself some day! No one knows how they are made, but if anyone has a shot it'll be you. I'm SURE of it!"

"Were you in many battles Master?" asked Martha.

"One or two, but I fought many duels. I'm a rare case, I died alone in a cave, but i refused to die an old man, so I sat and waited with my sword in my hands ready for any challengers. My body remained kneeling ready for battle long after I had passed. The Valkyrie made an exception for me because I died with every intention of going out swinging. That is why you will see some who have no weapon. They died in a fierce internal battle against cancer or depression or even old age. Some refuse to die even when their body gives out and so the Valkyries judge their unspent potential."

"So you don't necessarily have to be in combat just... fighting?" Asked Martha.

"Hai!" replied the samurai.

The food arrived and the theme this time was the food of the Mexican Zapatista revolutionaries. It seemed every meal was themed around great warriors from history. Lunch was tortillas, various stewed and grilled meats and vegetables, cheese, avacado, salsa, and Tequila.

The flavors were authentic and delightful and something about the surprise of not knowing what was coming seemed to help with the idea that this was going to be a long 9 years.

After the meal there was an hour long break, and then the afternoon battle began. The army was split into two factions, Black and Red.

The newer people were pushed to the front lines to assure that they would see at least some action, then the battle horn blew. The two sides charged at eachother screaming fury and strength. Martha was nearly deafened and found herself faster than many of her fellows who appears to all be charging at about the same pace. Giving over to the emotion of the affair however, she plowed forward a few paces ahead. She leapt off of the shield of the opponent directly in front of her, a tactic that she had learned in Fensilar, and found herself already broken through the enemy lines. In Fensilar many warriors would do this all at once, and so she would have allies on either side to fight with. Here however, she was alone and surrounded by the enemy. In the Fensilar camp a warrior who made it through their lines would find themselves quickly cut down from all sides. For Martha though, rather than being efficiently dispatched, a hole formed around her. She found herself in a ring of armored and fiersome warriors. A man in black and red wooden samurai armor stepped into the circle. His face-plate bore a vicious looking japanese demon and he drew a long sword from one hand and a shorter dagger in the other.

"My name is Miyamoto Musashi, and I challenge you."

"I am Martha McTerre, and I accept." Responded the woman.

Miyamoto stepped to the side and Martha was instantly blinded as he exposed the setting sun hidden behind his shoulder. Dazzled by the light and sensing movement she raised her meat tenderizer to parry where she could only guess the blow was coming from. She had guessed wrong. Musashi had lunged deep to her side and slashed clean through her legs sending her toppling to the ground looking at her stumps as they poured blood into the grass around her. Rage came over her and she crawled at the samurai and smashed his foot with her hammer and slashed at his ankles. He jumped back and limped back into a fighting stance. Martha started to get dizzy and began to feel nauseous. She forced down the feeling and scampered towards him. She stabbled at his thigh and he brought his sword down pinning her knife hand to the ground. He stood holding his sword into the earth as her blade was just narrowly short of its mark. She bellowed a deep throated primal cry and slammed her hammer into his hand that was still clutching the sword. He let go of the sword and Martha tried to use free her hand by knocking the sword to the side with her hammer. Musashi took a lightening fast step and her hammer wielding hand was completely sliced off with a flash of Miyamoto's smaller dagger.

Miyamoto Musashi then crouched next to her and lifted his face plate. A familiar smiling face came into view. "You broke my hand and my toes! I'm proud of you Martha! You're my new number one pupil! Sit by me at dinner!"

"No sit by me!" said a voice with a western accent.

"No by me!" English.

"You wounded Musashi! You're awesome!"

"...she was still fighting with her legs cut off? Man that's a stone cold bitch right there... shit was GANGSTA!" said someone else

"Lok'tar friend, the horde would be honored to have you!" said some green guy.

Martha finally faded out of consciousness from the blood loss.


	14. Good Ol' JK

"Loki!"

"What..."

"Can we go for another walk!?"

"No."

"Why?"

"Because we just went on one..."

"I want to go outsiiiiiiide! I think there's a bird out there!"

"Then go outside!"

"You have to come with me! It's not the saaaaame!"

"Fine!"

Loki saunters over to the door and steps outside. Angrboda pushes past him and rushes outside barking furiously at the tree. Loki sits down and goes back to reading through the original Sherlock Holmes series by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

As soon as he gets settled into his spot in the shade, opens his book and gets comfortable, he hears a high pitched whimper. He looks up and Angrboda is staring at the door.

"You want in?"

"Yuss..."

"You just came out..."

"It's hot out here!"

"Why are you LIKE this?!" growls Loki.

"The food's in there too..." whimpers Angrboda.

"If we go in, do you promise to leave me alone?" asks Loki.

Angrboda inhales sharply stifling a cry. "I don't want to leave you alone Loki."

"Why not?"

"Because you haven't spent any time with me yet."

"I've been HERE. This WHOLE TIME. With YOU."

"Loki, you've been next to me... but you seriously haven't paid me any mind. I don't know human stuff. I don't know how to play your games. Dogs don't come near me because I'm huge and ugly and terrifying. No one taught me how to human, and no one lets me be a dog. But I don't want to be alone. I want you to spend time with me. I'll do people things if that's what it takes but I want your companionship."

"Oh... then why the walks and the going outside and going inside and the begging for food and shoving basket balls on my crotch?"

"Because when I do those things, I get something from you, even if it's second of your attention... but you don't engage... you don't play WITH me, you just play to get me away from you for a second." Angrboda transfers into her human form, completely nude and beautiful and confusing, with her tight snow white curls and her heavy breasts and her impossibly pale skin, and rests her head on Loki's lap. "I don't know how to give back to you Loki! I don't know what you want, but I will give it if you just please, please see past the fact that I'm... annoying... and hideous... and needy... and all the other things all the other people call me... and dogs... dogs call me things too..."

Loki stares wide eyed and this near-perfect naked woman bearing her soul to him bawling with her head directly on his groin trying to figure out how to be a good person and very much NOT give in to his obvious basest male instincts in this moment.

"I'm... I'm sorry Angrboda..." Loki starts. "You're right. You don't know what to do with me, and I don't know what to do with you. I could at the very least try to teach you about being human. You may be a hideous dog, but your human form is... not... baaaaad..." Loki says trying not to admit to her or himself that she is breathtaking.

" Wait..." she jumps back on all fours causing her to be absolutely more suggestive than she already was. "Why do you smell like it's mating season... Loki? No no no! BAD Loki! BAAAAAD Loki! I know that smell!"

"Smell what smell!?"

"You're... ehem... aroused?"

"There's a smell?!"

"There's definitely a smell..."

"Well, don't worry, I'm in control..."

"I have MTV. When human men are aroused they are NEVER in control!"

"IS THAT WHERE YOU'VE BEEN LEARNING ABOUT HUMANS FROM?!"

"Yuss!" She said sitting up quickly looking wide eyed and bouncing just a little making Loki's... situation... worse.

She poofed back into her dog form, "I watched Who Let The Dogs out and didn't know how to change the channel so I've just been watching MTV for ever!" Her tail thumping proudly against the grass.

"Okay okay, so what you're telling me, is you've either been alone, or watching MTV this whole time?"

"No! before I got a TV in the I was just alone, alone."

"So wait... you're telling me I get to be the person to introduce someone to J.K. Rowling?"

"Is that... something we can do together?"

"Can you read?"

"No..."

Loki sighs, "Stay in dog form if you want to keep me from... smelling... dangerous... and stay still, and quiet."

"Still and quiet? That sounds like you want to leave me again... you men are always like "sit" and I sit, and "stay" and I stay, and "I'll be right back," and you're not right back... I'm loyal as fuck! Do you know how long I will sit and stay for?!"

"Just trust me."

"I don't trust you."

"Why not?!"

"You're the god of mischief... and you're horny... Horny god of mischief, what's to trust?"

"Just come over here!"

"I'm not coming over there! I'm a gods damned mess and you want to make puppies!"

"Oh for fucks sake take a leap of faith! I'm the only damned person who's going to give you the time of day in the whole universe, the least you can do is trust me!"

"Put you paw in my mouth."

"What?!"

"I mean your hand. Put your hand paw in my mouth!"

"Why?!"

"If you try to mount me I'll bite it off. I can trust you with your hand in my mouth."

"Ugh... you know what? Nevermind. I'm sorry I bothered trying to spend time with you."

"Smell's gone."

"What are you talking about now?"

"You don't smell... reproductive-y... now..."

"Of course not, I'm bloody well annoyed."

"I'm sorry..."

The giant poodle trots next to Loki, rests her head next to him and looks up with big sad poodle eyes. Loki glares at her for a minute and she lets out a whimper.

Loki waves his hand over the cover of his book and opens it again. He smiles at the big giant doof puppy laying next to him and says, "Mr. and Mrs. Dursely, of Number 4, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much..."

A thousand thousand lightyears away a tall powerful man in gold armor stands with golden eyes guarding a rainbow bridge. A man with long blond hair and a tinge of red to his beard dressed in biker leathers wearing a tool belt with a short handled sledge hammer walks up to the proud guardian. The biker says, "Is everything alright Heimdall?"

Heimdall wipes tears from his eyes and says, "Nothing! Fine! I'm fine Thor! Just... allergic to dogs..."

Heimdall blows his nose with a comical honking sound and stuffs his hanky back into his pocket. "Good Ol' J.K."


	15. Always Pick Cupcakes Over Being Haunted

Addison woke up starving. She never got to eat the night before and she spent most of the night crying which, if you've never done it for a long stretch, takes a lot out of you. When she woke up the house felt too warm. She was covered in sweat and her sheets were sticking to her skin. She was too tired to be furious just yet, but there was some instinct that put her on edge.

She heard thumping growing louder and realized what was coming.

"You useless fucking bitch!" Harold screamed as he slammed her door open.

"All you needed to do was get a god damned milkshake with that fat punk, but instead I get a text from Little Joey God damn Rattan telling me how you bailed on the poor little kid and he spent the whole night typing on his computer, angry about this and that."

"Dad I-"

"No! You shut up and listen you little cunt! You're going to go make nice with that boy today in school or you won't have a place to sleep! Wot's worse, is you didn't even bring any god damned groceries like I asked, so now I'm fucking starving! Give me your damned allowance so I can buy us some fucking food!"

Addison handed over her last twenty dollars.

"Now get to school and you suck his little prick if you have to, you make this right!"

Addison clenched her fists and stood up directly into the big scarred man's face, looked at his stupid gold teeth and cocked back her hand. She wanted to be strong. She wanted respect. She wanted to teach him a lesson. Her whole world was about to change. She let loose a massive slap with all her might. She felt the sting in her hand as it collided against his cheek. She could feel his stubble scrape her hand as her arm flowed through with a heavy momentum she didn't think she was capable of. The man's head turned almost completely aroundk with the force, and the recoil of the smack sent his entire body careening to the side.

She looked at her own hand in bewilderment and for a moment she saw muscles in her forearm she never knew she had. Her chest filled with confidence. She was more than just a victim. She always knew it deep down inside. She was small but mighty. She was not a girl, she was invincible. She was a woman.

Her dad straightened himself.

"You're just like your mother."

"Good!"

"She needed to be taught some respect too..."

"Bite me, asshole! You need to earn some respect."

"No... I just need to remind you of what you fuckin' are. A. Little. Fucking. Brat."

The words stung. When he stood to his full size she realized that little was not just an insult, it was an accurate descriptor. She was not the pinnacle of physical strength she needed to be for this contest. She wanted to be so small just now. She shrank within herself and could swear the man was almost growing larger as she realized her confidence may have been misplaced.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket. "Yeah, hi, this is Harold Donover, yeah, Addy's dad. Addy's gonna be out sick today. Nah, she fell down some stairs."

He hung up the phone, "You know you did this to yourself. Should've just done what you were told. The minute you get that, this all gets a whole lot easier."

Addy sat down on her bed and let her body go limp. All confidence and strength drained from her shoulders. She may have a mean slap, but he could kill her. She repeated what he wanted to hear hoping it would soften what was to come, "I did this to myself."

A knock on the front door. Harold's head whipped around.

"You keep your mouth shut."

Harold stormed down the stairs and opened the door. "Addy dear! You're going to be late for school. Come quickly child!"

"Who the fuck are you?"

"Oh such a mouth on you! You should really mind your manners when you speak to a fine lady such as meself!"

A lady with grey and black hair, dressed in an honest to god's maid outfit seemed to push right through Harold into the room.

"Addison my peach! I was walking my little Seamus to school like we always do together and saw that you weren't there! Your mother and I used to be such good friends so I decided to come check up on you!" said the lady with a slow nod to Addison.

"Oh thank you miss..."

"Oh no time for thanks, just put some clothes on, yer as nekked as a wee baby!" She turned to Harold, "As the kind and caring father you must be worried as to this stranger that's barging into your house. I apologize for your rudeness, I have not properly introduced myself, my name is Lilliana, I'm a good friend of your poor deceased wife and I just wanted to make sure the poor girl is alright."

"Well she ain't alright, she already called in sick, and you can get the fu-"

"Oh sick you say? Poor girl, let me check your temperature!" she put a hand up to Addison's head, but must've not even touched her as Addison felt nothing. "Oh no, no fever! Addison you naughty girl, were you faking it? My word the nerve of these teenagers, surely you can't let her get away with this, you must send her to school immediately!"

Harold turned red and attempted to stammer out a response, "Well... er... I..."

"Oh! So glad you agree! Young ladies need such a keen and responsible eye such as yours to put them on the right path. OH! Looky there! You seem to have a red mark growing on your face! Must be that aftershave, having a bad reaction eh? I imagine all yer friends will think some floozy slapped you a good one! Oh look at you with yer tattoos, I bet maybe you deserved it you naughty lad!"

Addison stepped out of the bathroom in her school clothes.

"OH! You look just lovely dear! Come outside I have some breakfast for you."

Harold's stomach grumbled, "Breakfast you say?"

"Oh none for you ya big strapping lad! You'll have to fend fer yerself I'm afraid! Come along deary!"

The strange busybody lady shuffled down the stairs and waited by the closed front door. "Would you mind getting that for me lass? My arthritis, you see."

Addison began to open the door for the strange lady who didn't bother waiting for it to open all the way, and simply walked through. Addison blinked for a moment as she swore that the lady passed right through part of the door itself, but she couldn't be certain.

There was a plate sitting on the curb with a cast iron plate cover.

"Could you pick that up for me deary it's quite heavy and my arthritis you know."

Addison picked up the plate and it was indeed quite heavy. She noticed that the lady was bleeding slightly from the nose.

Addison walked next to this stranger all the way to the school yard and motioned for her to sit down at a picnic table in the yard near the PE field. The lady appeared to have a small cut on her scalp

"Go on! Dig in! Made it me-self! If you don't eat the cupcake I'll haunt you forever!" Addison took a bite. "Oh dear, I have less time that I thought..." blood began pouring from a wound that had opened in the lady's torso. Addison jumped back in horror. "Traveled a long way to get to you! Sorry... I have a message for you! OHH! This is more painful than I expected... Two messages, I'm sorry I can't explain, but I don't have much time you see. First off, OH GODS..." The lady's arm appeared to be ripped off from the socket. Blood shot from the wound.

The lady doubled down on her resolve. She looked firm and brave and strong, she locked eyes with Addison and exuded kindness and inner strength. "Everything will be okay... mom is coming... and secondly if you ever need anything, just say whisper the name: Lo-..."

The lady's head literally vanished into thin air. Blood shot out of the neck and the lady collapsed, then vanished completely.

Addison's heart pounded and she stared wide eyed at the space where the lady was. There was no blood anywhere. Still she could not chalk this up to a hallucination or a nightmare.

Worse yet, she had evidence of the encounter in her hands and her mouth. The cupcake was real, at the very least. And by all the gods of her ancestors it was delicious. She remembered the strange apparition and it swearing to haunt her forever if she didn't finish the thing... and she was very hungry... and she really, really didn't want to be haunted...

Addison took another bite and headed straight for the library.


	16. My War Cry Would Totally Be CUPCAKES!

4 years had passed and Martha had trained under what she eventually learned was one of the greatest swordsmen of all time. Miyamoto Musashi was famed for inventing and perfecting the two sword style of japanese swordsmanship. He was more than just a master swordsman, though. The man was slight of build and relied on finesse, trickery, intimidation and insults to fluster and confuse his opponents.

She complained once that two sword style is not the same as hammer and knife, and he explained that the difference is not in how they are used, but in the muscles needed to use them. To swing a stick, or a sword, or a club one uses the same motions, but some require stronger forearms or shoulder and chest muscles depending on the placement of the weight on the weapon.

He taught her the necessity of crawling inside your opponent's head and setting off their rage before it can be useful. Rage can end a fight quickly, but if someone becomes enraged before the fight even starts, then they have to fight whilst recovering their emotional state, which can leave them at a disadvantage. He told the tale of how he defeated a swordsman who was thought to be more skilled, by simply showing up 3 hours late to the duel. He added insult to insult by refusing to fight with a sword and instead used a wooden oar that he cut down to the shape of a sword. Finally, he made sure he had his back turned towards the sun to make it harder for his opponent to see.

Miyamoto insisted that she wake earlier than the rest of the warriors and begin special training before the others and then again after training all day, running and exercising deep into the evening. She began to find her strength improving and the weight of the hammer to be getting less and less cumbersome. She began to match Miyamoto's speed and learned the secrets of his phenomenal footwork. She learned that you can create greater distance and take a favorable angle if you move in diagonals to your opponent rather than straight back and forth, but then you could explode straight forward into a fencer's style lunge to surprise your opponent with a move that betrayed what they thought was your style.

Miyamoto insisted that she spend time at the end of the line for the body hardening course and get some pointers from the best of them. It turns out that these folks were all empty handed fighters, meaning they didn't use weapons. The two males practiced a style of Thai kickboxing that focused on body hardening before they died, and the woman had studied at the Shaolin temple in China and trained in a style called "Iron Jacket Kung Fu." She explained that their philosophy comes from Yin and Yang. That there must be balance, and part of that means you must give something to get something, and that the price of strength is almost always pain. She gave Martha some Shaolin drills to help her condition herself to better resist injury, and the two kick boxers showed her where they trained in their off time. They had a small grove of banana trees that they spent kicking, elbowing, and punching until they felled the trees.

Miyamoto also insisted that she learn from a gruff old Japanese man who hailed from Okinawa. He was an expert in a style of Karate the demanded strict discipline. Rather than learn his style of combat though, he insisted that she mastered instead her mantra. He had chosen the traditional master of Karate, "Osu" which means "Patience" but insisted that "Gaijin" were selfish and needed something personal to draw upon. She decided her mantra would be simple. "Addison." She was a mother above all things and would use her mantra to be a constant reminder of why she woke up earlier, trained harder, and gave more than those around her.

Much to her surprise, she found herself excelling quickly through the ranks of the heroes of Asgard. There were some battles in the afternoons where she walked away completely unscarred.

Better yet, as she crossed back to Fensilar, she was able to pass along more of the philosophies of Valhalla than the other cross trainers. She found herself giving lessons and acting as an assistant weapons master during drills. Because of this, she quickly moved up the ranks of Fensilar as well. She was given more battle tactics to study and more scrolls and books to read of ancient wars. While they weren't her favorite stories, and often the wars were fought for terrible reasons, she found that she was uniquely capable of understanding the genius behind the tactics. She read of Hannibal's false retreat, General Lee's Rebel Yell, and Shaka Zulu's primitive pepper spray attack. He would chew spicy peppers in battle, and fill his mouth with water, then spew it into the face of his opponent inventing chemical warfare when his gunpowder wielding enemies had not even considered such a thing.

She brought this knowledge back to Valhalla and found herself running drills commanding ancient warriors who, because of her status as a rising star, trusted her every command. Both sides were eager to learn and she was eager to nurture their skills.

This was a high time for her, and although she had no way to see her daughter, she had received a kind and silent nod from Frigga from time to time which she came to understand her daughter was alive and safe. She wouldn't have learned this without the help of Lilliana who seemed keenly aware of what the goddess was thinking. Lilliana also made sure that whatever food was prepared, was perfectly balanced to suit Martha's training schedule. She always found an excuse to give her extra sugar, and much needed protein so that she could have the fuel needed to spend the extra hours training.

Odin seemed to be absent from the halls of Valhalla often, whereas Frigga diligently oversaw her charge. Lilliana explained that Odin was a wanderer and that his wisdom came from his travels. He also went on important missions overseeing the preparations for Ragnarok. She said that something was greatly troubling him though, and that he was spending more time away than usual.

One particular morning a peculiar sound boomed through all of Asgard. Heimdall had sounded a war horn which sent all of Valhalla and Fensilar on edge. Something was coming. Something big.

The discipline Fensilar soldiers drilled dawning their armor and weapons at a moments notice constantly and as such made it to the wall of Asgard first. The folks in Valhalla waited for orders and looked confused as to what need be done. Martha determined this would need to be worked on, but for now took charge. "War is here, warriors! This is our purpose! This is our end! To the walls!"

All of Valhalla made a great warriors cheer, pulled on their armor and charged to the wall. Their erratic footfalls were a low rumbling which only served to compliment the sharp marching of the Fensilar comrades.

Once they reached the wall, they saw that the sun had not yet risen. They heard a mighty roaring sound from the woods beyond the green fields. From the trees burst forth the source of the sound, a motorcycle with a powerful looking man with long blonde hair standing up leaning forward over the bar urging more speed from his bike. From the trees then came a huge black shadow. It was gaining on the bike in the open stretch of grass.

Martha quickly judged the distance and realized the bike would never make it to the wall in time. Not even close. Martha called for archers to fire, and a hail of arrows streamed towards the black beast. The arrows seemed to simply get caught in the beasts fur or otherwise bounce off of the beast. Martha was please to see that almost all of the arrows hit their mark, but made a mental note that bows themselves were likely not strong enough for the types of enemies they may face in the future.

She had guessed that many of the other heroes had fought such things before, but no one took the lead. She realized that while she was in the middle of the group as far as skill or savvy for now, she was the only one that both camps trusted and so all were waiting on her to give the orders.

"Thor will never make it, he appears to be without his hammer. We must buy him time! Charge and pray for an honorable second death!" Martha shouted.

Men and women spilled over the sides of the wall and charged at the great beast. An ocean of spears and swords split down the middle to allow Thor safe passage. On his back appeared to be another man with long dark hair wearing green and gold robes. He had been viciously wounded and did not appear conscious.

As they neared the beast the warriors saw that it appeared to be a wolf, although it was the size of a city bus. The hole in the lines closed in a fluid motion behind the rider and formed a tight barrier. The wolf ran straight into the line of soldiers appearing to ignore them completely. It expected the troops to spread out and attempt to dodge its massive claws as his feet hit the ground with tremendous force, but to its surprise, the soldiers tightened their formation and the beast found itself stomping its soft paws onto upturned spears and swords and other weapons. The few bodies it managed to crush only added to the unsure footing and the beast scrambled to stay on its feet. A shout lifted above the noise of the battle, "Myrmidons! Lift!" and cadre of greek warriors formed a ramp of sorts by interlocking their shields. A man ran up the ramp and as he hit the the highest row of shields, the men underneath threw their shields upward. The man running up the shields jumped as they did and it sent him flying straight over the beasts head.

Martha had to take a second to admire the man. He was chiseled muscular perfection and had long flowing blond hair. He flew through the air with his spear drawn back by both hands. As he landed on the back of the wolf's neck he plunged the spear down. The spear sank deep into its back and provided a handhold for the blonde warrior. The man then pulled out a short sword from a sheathe on his hip and began stabbing into the back of the wolf's neck with slow, patient accuracy and rhythm.

The wolf strained to bite at him, but he was just out of reach of the jaws. As he turned his head a woman in brass armor shouted and pointed at the beast's front leg away from its head. Her skin was dark and swarthy, her eyes were black and radiated intent. A group of black skinned men that followed her screamed "For Zenobia!" and charged at the leg. The wolf lifted its paw out of instinct at the slicing and chopping of the leg and another woman on horseback in a cowboy hat lassoed the lifted leg. She tipped her hat to Zenobia, who responded with a smile and a small bow.

The rider turned her horse and bolted off with a "yeehaw!" She stood up in her saddle as the horse dragged the wolf's leg to a spread, and turned around riding backwards whilst standing. She pulled a massive bowie knife and tossed it at the wolf sticking solidly inside its nose.

She wolf bellowed in annoyance and regained its composure. It then rolled onto its side shaking loose the man on its back and crushing a dozen soldiers in its wake. The hound righted itself again and pounced straight for the man who was on its back. To everyone's surprise it spoke, "Achilles, what an honor to feast on such a famous foe."

It's jaws began to descend as the fallen man scrambled to crawl away. Martha felt a stirring as she saw such a young man in fear and threw her hammer at the creature and began running towards it. The hammer struck square in the eye of the wolf and by a stroke of luck bounced into the reach of the woman. She began a series of simple but lightening fast strikes she had learned earlier called the Heaven Six pattern. A simple continuous flow of slashing and beating towards the creatures face. At every strike the creature winced and squirmed back towards a seated position as if it had just attempted to sniff a porcupine. Following her lead, javelins and arrows began to fly towards the creature driving it back. It slowly began to backpeddle until it tripped over its hind legs.

"Give it no room!" Martha ordered, "Send it to Hel!" more spears and javelins and charging warriors harried the creature back, and it took two bounding leaps away. It was all it needed to put itself out of range of all but the ineffectual archers. "Hel you say?" growled the creature. "What a splended idea... so much to eat there... I shall come back when I've grown..."

The creature then sped off into the forest. A cheer broke out among the crowd. Achilles, Zenobia, Martha, and Annie Oakley were carried back to Asgard on the shields of the warriors of Asgard as the heroes of the hour.

As they reached Valhalla one of the largest warriors in the front of the throng shouted, "WAIT! Something is AMISS! Do you SMELL!?"

Other warriors began sniffing the air.

The men shouted in unison, "LILLIANA'S CUPCAAAKES!"

The warriors charged even faster than before and stormed the halls of Valhalla. Along the rows of tables were piles of cupcakes each perfectly frosted with pink swirls and a cherry on top. Huge glasses of milk were laid out at every seat and at the head of the table a sheepish Odin guiltily licked icing off his fingers as Lilliana sat scolding him for not waiting for everyone to be seated.


	17. Florida Man Strikes Again!

**A/N- Alright guys! We're apparently 2/3(ish) of the way through this, although it may eventually get extended even farther. Feel free to leave comments or requests. Mucho love all around!**

"And so that's why I think that while Harry might be a bit gifted, it's obvious that Hermione is the best wizard among them." Said the poodle wearing a Hufflepuff scarf.

"Ah but what of Ron?" asked the viking god of mischief.

"Ron is a garbage human and Hermione deserves soooo much better!"

"Who would you pair her with then?"

"Malfoy, duh! He's not complete garbage and he has money, and balls, and I think she would make him a better person."

Loki gave a swish and flick motion with a stick and a basketball hovered in the air. He then sent his wand forward in a pushing motion and said "Flipendo!" and sent the ball flying.

The giant poodle barked and chased after it across the grassy field. The sun was starting to set and Loki was beginning to get tired. I had taken them a full year to get through the books, movies, as they both had short attention spans and also began focusing on some other pursuits.

Loki was amazed at how quickly the poodle had learned, and both relieved and secretly upset that she chose to stay in her poodle form for fear of his libido.

When Angrboda returned with the basket ball she dropped it at Loki's feet. "So can we go there?"

"Where?" asked Loki.

"Can we go to Hogwarts?" Responded Angrboda.

"Oh! ... well... umm.. Hogwarts isn't actually..."

Angrboda sat on her hind legs her tail slapping back and forth with enthusiasm.

Loki realized he didn't have the heart to begin discussing fiction and fantasy to her just yet.

"It isn't actually in England anymore. They moved it. To Florida."

"Florida? Isn't that where all the crazy people live?"

"Yes. Everyone in Florida is insane, and as such, a perfect place to hide a wizarding school. Would you like to go there?"

"Are we invited?! DID AN OWL COME?!"

"Well, we are too old, you see, but we are allowed to visit."

"They will let us past their wards and into the school grounds and let us pet Norbert and fly brooms!?"

"Well.. not exactly, but you'll enjoy yourself none-the-less. But they won't let me bring you as you are."

"Just say I'm your pet!"

"Only owls and rats and things are allowed, no giant dogs. You'll have to go as a human."

"Ew. Every time I do that you get all... predictable..."

"Yes well it's time we discuss something to that extent. You really must understand the importance of clothes."

"Clothes aren't important."

"Well yes, yes they are."

"Why?"

"Well firstly they keep us modest, which avoids... distractions."

"No it doesn't."

"Yes it does."

"Nope."

"Explain your reasoning then, Angrboda."

"Well, you wear clothes and cover yourself. When you expose yourself you become a distraction, because humans aren't used to seeing the body outside of a sexual context. If you saw bodies all the time in all sorts of contexts then you wouldn't get as distracted. Your males would probably have better self control. Dogs can lick themselves, are naked all the time, and the female dogs have way more boobs, and our males are still better at waiting for permission then human males."

"I... well... yes..."

"But I see your point, it's not practical unless the whole world was already doing things my way. I'd better just adapt to your customs for now and promote change through rational effective channels."

"Well fuck."

"Yes?"

"You woke as fuck, dog."

"Wurd. So if you're going to insist I wear clothes, then I get to pick the clothes. Yes?"

"Sure?"

"And I get to pick your clothes too!"

"No."

The giant poodle pants with excitement, eyes gleaming with anticipation.

"NO!"

After a few weeks of making reservations and booking tickets, Heimdall granted them passage to Orlando, Florida.

Loki Laufeyson, the great Norse god, the doer of good and the doer of evil, the father of the wolf and the mother of the steed, spinner of lies and murderer of gods, the great instigator, insulter, and rival of Thor stood in line for the Hogwarts Express ride at Universal Studios in Orlando Florida, looking rather handsome in his Slytherin Robes, sorting hat, and carrying a very authentic looking Nimbus 2000. Next to him stood a picture perfect, though slightly younger recreation of Rita Skeeter.

Loki spent the entire day following her from frantically from ride to ride, trying fire whiskey and butterbeer and every flavored beans. Loki couldn't help but smile and admire her nonstop enthusiasm and positivity. She was annoying, impulsive, sensitive, and generally ignorant of all normal customs, but she devotedly signed autographs for children by the dozens who thought she was the real Rita Skeeter. She even gratefully donated Loki's broom and sorting hat to a baby in a Hedwig onesie and a young girl in dragon pajamas roaring at people, as prizes for "best dressed."

After dizzying roller coasters and junk food and more booze than was responsible, the night came and put a comforting weight at the end of the day. They sat on benches next to a river that flowed in between the different "Islands of Adventure" and waited patiently for the promised closing fireworks show.

Loki was glad to be off of his feet, and his head was reeling with flush excitement from all of the little adventures they experienced together that day.

"Loki?"

"Hmm?"

"Thank you for lying to me."

"What do you mean?"

"For letting me think it was all real..."

"Ah."

"Just because it wasn't real, doesn't mean it wasn't beautiful. It's still important to me."

"Yes dear."

"Dog."

"What?"

"I'm a dog, not a deer. Deers are food."

"Yes... dog..."

"Loki?"

"Hmm?"

"Did you really think I wouldn't figure out that it was just a story when you brought me here?"

"I had hoped."

"That's... very good of you... but, lying is bad."

"I'm the god of lies. Am I bad?"

"You are good... and bad..."

"So then I am no different. Just like my lie to give you some good, to spare you some pain, I can be good."

"Is it hard?"

"Is what hard?"

"To wait for permission."

"It depends, but yes. It's very hard."

"Do you want permission?"

The thought struck him hard. That he and Angrboda could actually...

"Well... I guess you don't..." said Angrboda.

"Why do you say that?"

"Because you haven't been looking for it..."

Loki turned and looked towards Angrboda. She looked at his lips and up to his eyes. He looked at hers and she bit her bottom lip just slightly. He leaned in a bit closer, hesitant. She moved back towards him. As they finally pressed their lips together there was a cracking sound, and a bright flash of light. Fireworks shot in the background, and Loki admitted to himself that he was not hating this price. He worried what the Norns knew would come of this, but buried the thought in his mind as he pulled his companion in closer and tasted her lips, and cheek and neck.


	18. That's As Many As 4 10s- It's Terrible

"... She was all over me! I mean look at my shirt! It's covered in makeup! She kept me up so late I didn't even have time to change for school this morning! What's worse is she was all over me right in front of her own dad. He's a drug addict so she must have daddy issues, you know how those girls get... any time a strong male comes into their life they just lose control!"

Johnny was bragging to his friends, showing off the makeup that had smeared onto his shirt when Addison made the mistake of letting him hold her while she was crying.

"Uh oh, here comes the slut now!" Johnny said, pretending to hush his voice, but knowing full well that Addison could hear him.

Addison stormed right past him, Lacy, Macy, and Jacey. She went straight to the Library. She passed fiction, textbooks, literature, and went straight to religious and paranormal books which were sparse in the non-fiction section. She grabbed anything that had to do with ghosts, the afterlife, and the paranormal. She also stopped and hesitated next to a book called "The Great Cupcake Cookbook" but went on past it.

Almost as soon as she sat down, a man came over to her. He had a thin comb-over that had obviously been dyed brown as the roots were already turning to greyish. The dye must've been cheap because it seemed almost blonde just past the grey before the thin strips of brown wormed across his spotty scalp. He had a thick brown mustache and even thicker glasses. He was a man who was so weak in build and character that his chief form of fulfillment was ultimately his position. His name tag read: Principle Finklestein.

"Young lady, this library is closed, for detention only. Unless you want to be punished, I suggest you get to class pronto." His voice was nasally and wholly underwhelming in its lack of presence or authority. He was the type of leader that, should he actually face a real challenge would instantly have to delegate the responsibility to real men.

"Detention, you say?"

"Yes, young lady."

Addison got out of her chair, marched out into the hallway.

"Uh oh... maybe she can't get enough, maybe she wants some more! Sorry ladies, but it looks like I'm going to be... OH FUCK! JESUS NO! HOLY HELL!"

Addison marched directly up to Johnny who was still regaling his friends with his made up exploits of the night before. She hauled off and planted her Converse sneaker directly between his legs. While she wasn't sure she felt anything with her foot, she must've managed to hit something of importance because Johnny went down like a garbage bag full of mayonnaise.

Johnny held himself and wheezed in and out trying to suck in badly needed air. Lacy, Macy, and Jacey all stared at the wheezing pile of puke on the floor. "That's for lying about me, that's for insulting my mum, and that's for being an awful person! If you were a nice guy, you would be nice even when it hurt to be nice. It's not because you're fat, it's not because you're a dork who wears a stupid hat, it's because you're a terrible person. You ever lie about me again, and I'll take your nuts with me next time!" Addison shouted as she stuck her finger in the little man baby's face.

Lacy turned to Addison, "That was so cool..."

Macy, "Omg way cool..."

Jacey, "Totally cool..."

"Young lady!" Finklestein, "You just earned yourself some detention!"

"Oh nooo the library, my only weakness, how did you knooooow..." Addison said as she strolled back to the library.

As soon as the door closed and the coast was clear Johnny pulled out his cell phone. "Dad, can you pick me up?! That girl had like 15 ISIS's come beat me up! I would've fought them off but I didn't have my katana... and she said *sniff* my hat *sob* was *sob* s-stupid..."


	19. Odin is Oprah- Everyone Gets A Reward

After the great battle of the wolf, the heroes who turned the tide were called to the head of the feast.

Odin stood above them all, with Frigga by his side. "Honored dead. Let us bow our heads in a moment of silence for those brothers and sisters who fell today outside the walls of Asgard. Those who die beyond the wall are going to their final doom. They cannot be gifted the resurrection of Valhalla. Their spirit essence will go the way of their bodies, they will be recycled through the roots of Yggdrassil, the mighty tree of life, and be given life anew in one of the mortal realms."

All solemnly bowed their heads, some of the newer people who were not yet familiar with the concept looked shocked, but none looked scared or questioned their place here. These were all the heroes of Midgard that had already died in battle willingly, and would willingly do so again.

"Now!" Boomed Odin with a more joyous tone, "Let us HONOR our HEROES!"

A cheer broke out among the hall.

"Achilles! Step forward!"

He did so.

"You have never let down these halls, and with every attack you have always shown your courage. I have been hiding a special secret from you, and I wish you now to receive it. You wished for immortality, and so you have it among the halls of Valhalla. What you don't know is that you have a sort of immortality amongst the Midgardians as well. BEHOLD! A MIGHTY BOON! This is a Blue Ray special edition copy of "Troy." It is a fanciful retelling of your tale a full 3,000 years after its events. What's more is that it is starring a one Brad Pitt who you will find... rather charming indeed..." Odin said with a wink as he passed along the movie.

"Great Odin, you have honored me in the past, with a dwarven shield, armor, sword, and spear. None has brought me greater joy than knowing my life's goal, to be forever honored in Midgard has come so true. I humbly accept this boon, and renew my pledge of loyalty to this, the only court that deserves my allegiance," replied Achilles. "Myrmidons! Popcorn!" More cheering.

"Zenobia! Come forth!"

The dark skinned lady who commanded the forces to strike the wolf's leg stepped forward.

"Your keen eye for an enemy's weaknesses, and your ability to inspire loyalty has earned you honor in these halls before, but today you showed not just ability, but synergy with another great warrior. I gift to you a steed! She is a mare of Sleipneir's own bloodline! You ride the six legged mare Desert Wind! You will sit above the lines and view the battle from the back of a horse that can outrun almost any creature in the woods beyond the wall!"

Zenobia nodded curtly, "Many men bring me gifts, oh Odin, but you always seem to know what I need. Give me power and men, not jewels and trinkets! Thank you great one."

"Oakley! Get your whiskey breath, horse shit smelling ass up on this platform!" Shouted Odin, in a horrible butchering of a southern drawl.

"You old cantankerous cow pie! I'd shoot yer other damn eye out if'n I had me a gun! But NOOOO! Yer damned dwarves can figure out how to forge a neutron star into a tack whacker, but haven't figured out how to make gun powder yet!" Responded the firey cowgirl who lassoed the wolf's foot.

"Well I'll be hog-tied and deepfried! You done ruined my surprise!"

"No.."

"Yes..."

"NO!"

"YES! Annie... GIT YER GUN!"

Odin pulled out a beautiful silver six-shooter from behind his back. She ran straight to him and squealed like a five year old opening her first Barbie.

Odin's voice calmed down thoroughly, "Now Annie, this is not really a gun, it aims, and shoots just like one, but it is actually a piece of stolen technology from our friends the Chitari. It will shoot a blast of energy that will pack quite a wallop, and it will only shoot 6 times before it needs to recharge for about 9 minutes. It is very unique and very dangerous. I expect you to treat it with respect, and great caution."

"Yes-sir!" Annie replied as she twirled the thing every which way, tossed it spinning into the air and caught it with the empty holster she wore on her belt.

"That's my girl! Now, we have one more person to honor today, and this is her first time being honored amongst us, so I wanted to give her something special. She died in a fierce battle to protect her child from a terrible man. That person was supposed to be the father of her child, but was even by her first birthday a cruel and neglectful parent. We the gods took favor upon her and gave her a boon of gold and other midgardian gifts since her daughter was named god-child to our very own Loki. When she had her financial independence secured, she immediately went home and decided to take her belongings and leave her husband..."

Martha's memory of that day flashed before her eyes.

"Leaving me? You can't leave me! I'm the only thing you've got in this life! Where you think your gonna live without me supporting your useless ass?" Screamed a younger Harold. He was still a bit trimmer now, and he had all of his teeth and didn't have the big scar across his face and neck.

"I don't need you anymore, me and Addison will be well provided for. You can stay here and drink beer with your friends without us interrupting you no more." Responded Martha in a clear and unhidden beautiful Irish accent.

"You'll be taken care of but what about me? We rented this flat together! I can't afford it without you working at the pet store! You're just gonna saddle me with all this? And who is takin' care of you now? Who did you shag behind moi back to get this little meal ticket started? Was it Steve, that little skinny runt that hangs out with Big Joe an' all them?"

"No... I'll be taking care of myself from now on, you'll have to do the same."

"Like hell I will, you ain't going nowhere!" Harold grabbed Martha's arm and Martha pulled away. Harold frantically grabbed at her again and she slapped away his hands. "HAROLD! STOP!"

Harold smirked at her. "If you won't stay, then she stays with me. Big Joe owns the local judges and I'll get custody, you can fuck off and send us child support."

"I will not leave Addison with you. Ever!"

"Come here little baby... that's right... Daddy is here... and I'm going to get fullllll custody, and you'll never see mommy again..."

Just as he said this Addison began crying, still too young to know what he was saying, but knowing full well that something bad was taking place.

"Shut up you little runt!" said Harold, already losing his patience, screaming at the baby of course only making it cry harder. "SHUT UP I SAID!" shouted Harold now as he gave the baby a firm shake.

"PUT MY BABY DOWN, HAROLD!"

"I'll teach you some respect you little runt!" Harold pulled back his fist staring daggers at the child. He sent his big gorilla hand hurtling towards the child without any thought of her safety. Before he could connect however, Martha charged the man throwing all of her weight into his knees. He dropped Addison and toppled over.

"That's IT you FUCKING Cunt!" Harold kicked Martha off of him and rose to his feet. He grabbed her by the hair and dragged her into the kitchen. She grabbed the hand holding her long red hair and pulled herself towards it. When the hand was close enough she bit down causing him to scream let go. She jumped to her feet and tried to run back to Addison to make sure she was okay. She had been screaming since she and Harold toppled over.

Harold grabbed the back of her shirt and yanked her back. Sharp pain cut across her back as she was hurled into the counter. Harold grabbed her neck and started crushing her wind-pipe. Her hands floundered for something nearby to strike him with. She managed to open a drawer as she began to get dizzy from the lack of air. Her vision began to tunnel and her strength began to fade. With her right hand she felt something in the drawer and immediately swung it at Harold's face. There was a sharp crack as a heavy metal object collided directly with Harold's mouth. Martha had managed to grab a meat tenderizer and slammed it into his face. Harold fell back and grabbed his face with both hands making a deep watery moan. He pulled his hands away and spat out blood and several teeth. He looked up at Martha snarling like a crazed bull, blood and spitty foam flowing from his mouth.

He charged for Martha again slamming her further down the kitchen counter. She struck him with the hammer again in his torso cracking ribs and beating against his back. He wrapped his arms around her and her right arm was trapped under his left. He had her pinned against the cabinets and the counter and began punching her in the face. She tried to slap away his fist with her left arm, but his punches were too strong and blasted right through her guard. She quickly started to become stunned and dazed and once again fell herself slipping out of consciousness.

Once she stopped moving, Harold, trembling with rage turned from Martha and pulled out a flip phone. "Hey Big Joe, it's Harold. Yeah... you still take ladies to sell to them horny blokes in South America? Yeah... me and Martha just had a falling out. You can have her on the cheap. She's passed out right now in me kitchen. No, no, you can't have the kid, Martha left her will to Addison, I don't get nuffin' unless I'm her legal guardian or what-not... Yeah roight, see you in fifteen. Cheers."

Just as the phone clicked shut, a kitchen knife slid across Harold's neck. While Martha was slipping away from the beating Harold had given her, she took the last action she could think to do. She played dead. Once Harold appeared distracted by his phone conversation. She moved slowly and quite to the drawer that was still opened. She pulled the biggest sharpest knife from the drawer and attempted to slit Harold's throat.

Harold stood up and turned around and screamed a gurgling bellow at Martha. There wasn't enough blood, Martha realized she must not have cut deep enough to hit any major veins, just nicked his windpipe. He rushed her again but before he could reach her she slashed at his face leaving a deep gash. Harold pushed through the pain all adrenaline and fury. He pinned both of her arms to her waist, picked her up and threw her to the ground. Her head smashed against the counter on her way down.

Martha watched the scene unfold from outside of her corpse. Her death was instant upon the unlucky landing. She watched as Harold rained punches down on her lifeless corpse. All pain was gone now and she hovered above the scene. A woman with midnight black skin, a beautiful face, a very full figure, and an afro tied back with a gold band sat on the counter next to her watching Harold beat the disfigured body beneath him.

"Honey, you have very poor taste in men..." said the winged lady. She watched as Big Joey and his young adult son Little Joey argued over the price of helping Harold make it look like a car accident and then hauled her body away to a vehicle waiting outside. Little Joey gave Harold something "for the pain." Harold said, "Nah, I never touch drugs." Joey responded, "Nah, this is from a doctor, it's just a little Vicodin to take the edge off." Harold popped a few of the pills.

Winged lady touched her arm, "You did good, sugar, you protected your baby, now it's time to for you to meet the big man." She spoke with a thick sensuous Swahili influenced accent.

"Who are you?"

"My name is Nandi, I'm a mother too. My son Shaka would have LOVED you. Now let's get you safe, your little girl is going to be fine."

Martha snapped out of her memory, she shuddered at the thought of the fight. She felt so foolish, now that she was properly trained she realized that she could easily have beaten the man several times. He wasn't a better fighter or even a very good one. He was just stronger. She smiled faintly at the thought of what would happen if she were given the opportunity to fight him again.

"Martha, please come forward to collect your prize!" shouted Odin. "You gave my army the order to fight beyond the wall. You trained them to move as a single unit. You threw your hammer into the eye of a mighty wolf. Most importantly however, you saved my son! Thor could very well have been destroyed by that cruel beast, and all who were there attest that Thor would have never reached the wall before it came upon him. Without his hammer, there was little hope... that was until hope snarled and told the universe that its name is Martha!"

The whole host cheered and clapped.

"While I have't the magic to send you back to your daughter, which is the boon you deserve, I did get an idea from one of the feats of skill you performed. You wield a short handled hammer much like my son. You even threw the damn thing like he does, and it even returned to your HAND like his famous hammer! Here I give you a named weapon! Mother's Hope!" As Odin said this, Lilliana came forth holding the weapon high above her head. It was a silver hammer with a white leather handle. It was a mirror image of Mjolnir, but slightly smaller and bright and shining where Mjolnir was dark and rough.

Frigga stepped forward and spoke in a lofty voice, "Whosoever loves and nurtures one with the pure love of a mother for her child shall be worthy to wield the power of this hammer. Odin and his dwarves crafted Mjolnir, the thunder bringer, Frigga and her dwarves have crafted Mother's Hope, the light bringer! Forged in the light of a newborn star, this weapon holds the essence of all the potential of the lives that will depend on that stars light and warm embrace. Odin himself cannot lift this hammer. When you throw it, it will return to your hand. When you will it to do so, it will shine forth light, either to guide your way, to blind your foes, or to be a beacon of hope to all who live in fear. Should you ever lose your motherly love, you shall be unworthy and be unable to lift this weapon."

Lilliana passed Mother's Hope to Martha who held it aloft. It shined a soft white glow that filled the room, the warriors stood silent in awe. 3 blonde Valkyries floating in the air above the crowd looked amazed and said, "That is so cool.." "Omg, way cool..." "Totally cool.."


	20. Shapeshifter Life is Weird

3 years had passed now since he first arrived at Angrboda's home, and Loki and Angrboda had only grown fonder. Loki taught her about humanity, about their downfalls and their virtue. He showed her the wonderful world of literature, taking her through Tolkien and Martin and Maas and Salvatore and Golden. When she had finished devouring the latest Goodkind novel, he eventually decided that it was time to teach about the glories of terrifying wonderful hit-or-miss world of fan-fiction.

She spent hours poring through story after story thrilled that she didn't have to wait for shipping or spend any money. She commented and reviewed sometimes in a nonsensical way that involved lots of "tail wagging" and "panting" which made her sound like a fetishist of some sort.

Loki stumbled into her bedroom one day and found her curled up asleep in her dog form. She used her dog form less and less as she felt that putting Loki in a mating mood became more and more appealing.

She found that Loki, who was often patient and sly in conversation, was actually a fierce and wild lover. He always tended to her needs, but when it came time to tend to his own, he was hard and strong and without mercy. When he allowed his true nature to shine through, he craved power and thrived on dominating his prey.

Angrboda thought that this would make her uncomfortable, but she found quite quickly that the act of submission was really a sort of power in itself. Loki could only feel powerful if she _let_ him feel powerful in these situations. She would play to his fantasies and resist his control, slowly and intentionally surrendering to his will. She would occasionally turn the tables on him, and tease him to his breaking point just to remind them both that she was not powerless, but rather played his game with him.

She was pleased to see that he wasn't above using his ability to shape shift in the bedroom. He would make sure that his equipment was always the right size to please her or push her limits, but never enough to harm her or make it unbearable. He sometimes approached with a muscular frame and masculine vigor, and other times with a thin pretty boy figure and effeminate confidence which he called his "Frankenfurter Special." She found both hard to resist for entirely different reasons.

As Loki entered the room, he lay down with his head on her stomach. "How are you today my canine companion?"

"Doing well, Loki."

"Do you have any plans for this evening?"

"Indeed I do."

"Oh?"

"I would like to give you a gift!"

"Oh, that's no fair, I haven't got you anything!"

"That's okay, you don't know about the special occasion yet!"

"Special occasion?"

The giant poodle hopped up and walked over to her closet. She came back with a poorly wrapped present.

"For you!"

Loki made a show of carefully unwrapping the gift although the wrapping paper was already falling apart. He pulled aside the lid to a box, and found a dog collar in it. It was too small for Angrboda, so he wondered for a second if it were a kinky gift for him of sorts, then he realized it was too small even for his boyish effeminate form that he sometimes donned for her. He realized now that there was a tag on the collar. He held it up to the light. It read: Fenrir Lokison

Loki blinked and looked up at Angrboda. "Are you... are you certain?!"

"Yep, just got back from the vet! You still need to read the card."

"OH! Sorry!" Loki said as he scrambled for a card that sat underneath the collar.

It read in scrawling and terrible handwriting, "Seriously, it's been 3 years, propose already you big moron! -Love Angrboda"


	21. Awakening On The Horizon?

**A/N We're 2/3 of the way through! Only 10 chapters left (although he's considering writing a sequel if he gets enough reviews/follows/favorites). As always, feel free to review with requests/writing prompts or send them to me through PM. Mwah! 3**

Addison spent the weeks barely clinging onto her grades as she tore through the internet and the library books trying to find anything she could about ghosts and the afterlife. She even began to study witchcraft and stumbled upon northern European paganism. She instantly found a kinship with the latter, and couldn't help but fascinate herself with the pantheon of gods and the strange creatures in their mythology.

She especially liked the magic involved. One would carve runes and imbue them with meaning. Then one would sacrifice to them something that mattered. Some modern practitioners chose to sacrifice money or food, and others gave pain or blood. The secret was, it had to be something you genuinely didn't want to give away. It wasn't the earthly value of the object, but the true spiritual value that it held for you. You would then ask the gods to accept your sacrifice and imbue the rune with some special quality or to give you some special message or gift.

You could never ask for a specific item however, you could only ask them to help push your fate towards a certain goal. She once made her own set of runes, and as a sacrifice she dug her nails deep into her flesh and gave her comfort away. She cast the runes and asked what was to come. The 3 runes that landed before her were Thurisaz, Hagalaz, and Dagaz. Thurisaz was a complicated rune. Though simple to draw, the old poems explain that it is of an evil giant. It is the rune that describes possibly the pain of child birth or losing one's virginity. Next was Hagalaz, which was plain as day, this was a rune of destruction and death. Finally was Dagaz which seemed to be the most hopeful. It spoke of a dawn, or clarity, or perhaps an awakening of some sort.

She didn't quite know how to translate this into a prediction of sorts, but she felt hopeful in that while she had come to expect suffering from this life, the idea of a sunrise in her future was unexpected.

She had eventually given in after passing the "The Great Cupcake" book and had dug through the pages. It appeared to be a book in which the author had collected cupcake recipes from around the world. There was Cayenne Chocolate cupcakes from Mexico, Custard Filled Cupcakes from France, and even a Mochi Cupcake made from sticky rice flour that was steamed and filled with a red bean paste, then given a pink cherry blossom petal out of icing for a top. She stumbled across a cupcake that someone had the audacity to name "The Perfect Cup Cake", this one was from Ireland, it was a dark chocolate cupcake with a splash of scotch whiskey for flavor, and a dark cherry icing mixed with powdered sugar until the icing went from a dark red to a perfect light pink. Finally, one of the dark cherries was placed on top and the whole thing was sprinkled with sugar that had been mixed with the cherry juice and dried to produce red sugar sprinkles. The name under the submission was Lilliana McTerre.

Because McTerre was her mother's maiden name, and because the cupcake looked so perfect, Addison decided that she would make this cupcake for her sweet 16th birthday which was just 1 month away.

As she began planning out her birthday, making a neat little list, her phone vibrated.

She pulled it from her hoodie pocket and unlocked the screen. There was a text message from what was listed on her phone as "Johnny Rotten." It read, "Sorry for being such a jerk, I bought you a birthday present. Can I come to your party?"

She responded, "There is no party."

"Can I see you to give you your present?"

"Just give it to me at school."

"Please please please meet me after? I promise I won't be weird, I'll just come to your dad's place, we don't have to do a date or anything."

"Fine, but if you do anything I don't like, I'll punch you in the wiener."

She added to her list, "Get first birthday present since mom died..."


	22. You: The River Is Swords Me: Jumps In

It had been a full 8 years and 8 months since the last graduation of the Valkyries in Fensilar. Martha had since become an especially revered commander and a terrifying duelist. She had helped turn Valhalla's skilled warriors into a cohesive unit, and she helped turn Fensilar's devastating soldiers into individual champions as well. She had earned a blade to replace her kitchen knife, a brutal Seax knife that made for an efficient chopping and stabbing.

Lilliana had become a true asset to her as well as a loyal friend. She provided a warming and motherly embrace when the training became too hard, and was always ready with a perfect chocolate cupcake when there was an excuse to celebrate. She also explained more about the way the afterlife worked.

Apparently, there was an enchantment in the halls of Valhalla and Fensilar and their greater training areas, which gave them the ability to heal or resurrect twice a day when the horns for lunch and dinner are blown. Beyond the border of their training ground, they were vulnerable and could experience true death. True death is when your spirit and life essence would be recycled by the roots of Yggdrasil to be used for the creation of new life. Your life essence would usually be deposited wherever it was needed, you could potentially come back as a moth, two trees and part of a star. One could undergo a spell granting one a second life in the form of their choosing, but you would have no memory of the previous lives, so this would essentially be meaningless.

The gods themselves, and all of the souls of Asgard, as well as everyone in Helheim are all subject to true death, and as such, great precautions are taken. It is also known that the Jotun will someday attempt to take the nine realms, and in so doing cause the death of all things. Odin knows it is hopeless, but still insists on building an army of the honored dead to try to resist the Jotun invasion all the same. Odin in his glory promised that he shall be the first to fall at the battle of Ragnarok if he cannot defend his home by himself, then the rest will be up to us and the other gods.

As Martha was sitting patiently through her lunch, listening to the suggestions of some of the other leaders about what ways they could improve their battle plans, Frigga abruptly interrupted the meal.

"Martha, I must see you in the war room immediately. I will have your lunch brought to you there."

Martha stood instantly and hurried to the room where the gods and generals of Fensilar met in secret. The room was empty save for Frigga, and the great table which housed a living map of Asgard. It showed the weather down to the clouds and the position of the sun and moon. Except for the living creatures it was a perfect over head view of the land.

"I could not speak of this until I had someone else discovered it. Our friend has appeared again." She motioned with her hands and the map zoomed in on an extreme border of Asgard. It was where the surrounding woods were cut off by a river. She whispered a few words and a being came in to focus on the map. It was the wolf from 4 years before. It had grown to an enormous size now, and was swimming across the river.

"Oh dear!" said a soft voice from behind.

Martha turned to find Lilliana carrying her lunch with the heavy cast iron plate cover keeping it warm. Martha, despite all her training still never seemed to see how Lilliana preferred to carry the cast iron plate and warmer around over something lighter. They were so unwieldy and awkward.

"He can swim through Gjoll..." said Lilliana. "The river of blades..."

"Why do they call it that?" Asked Martha.

"It's not a metaphor, deary," responded Lilliana.

Martha leaned in closer to the map and squinted. She saw that it was true. The river was a swiftly flowing current of swords and knives and axes. They seemed to rage and dip and leap like rapids and even pour down short waterfalls and splash viciously onto the banks of the river. The tremendous wolf was easily the size of a cathedral, and even it struggled to keep its head above water as it braved the raging currents of steel.

"If he makes it past the river, and over the wall... he'll enter Helheim, the realm of the new goddess Hel. All the souls of Volksvanger, the souls of good honorable people who do not wish to fight, will be at his mercy. How could he grow so strong?!" Asked Lilliana.

Frigga turned to her and spoke, "I'm so sorry. I cannot tell you. Please explain to Martha."

"Yes m'lady. Frigga was given both a gift and a curse. She knows all. She knows how to get you to your daughter, she knows how to stop the wolf, she knows if we can stop the end times, she even knows when and how each of her children will die. The cruel twist of this gift is that she cannot influence the actions of any of this until the knowledge has been gained by another. She cannot tell you what is to come, she cannot fight for her child's life, and she cannot do anything that would tip the odds in one's favor until the secrets of the event are revealed naturally. This means she can at times provide hints one might have overlooked but has knowledge of, or create unrelated events that might help prepare one for what is to come, but ultimately she is forced to play chess against the world with only one piece, and can only move it when the universe allows." Said Lilliana.

"But now, is not the time to mourn my suffering, now is the time to act. This wolf isn't the only reason you're here Martha. I can tell you that a Valkyrie has been sent to watch Addison tomorrow morning," said Frigga. There was pleading in her voice when she added, "Please understand."

Martha felt comforted for a moment by the thought that one of her soon to be sisters was going to be watching over her daughter, until it dawned on her. "No..."

"I'm so sorry," said Frigga. "There's nothing that you can do."

"What do you mean there's nothing I can do? Someone must do something!" Yelled Martha.

"These are my orders. You must take your forces to Helheim, and buy the gods time to deal with this wolf. You must not become distracted. If _you_ attempt to help your daughter, all will be lost." Said Frigga.

"You sent for us both though m'lady," said Lilliana. "Martha cannot help, you say, but your intention is clear. If I am allowed into Helheim... if I retire my post as baker in Valhalla... then I can go, and with the permission of a god or goddess, I can help my descendant... by sending a message or an omen..."

"Your descendant?" Asked Martha.

"Yes deary. If I retire from my position as baker and servant of Valhalla, then I can go to Helheim, and, with a god's permission, send a message to my great granddaughter."

"I Frigga, grant you, Lilliana McTerre permission to project yourself to your great granddaughter to deliver one message and one gift to Addison Donover, should you reach the reflecting pools of Helheim."

"You're Lilly McTerre? You're my grandmother? You..."

"Yes deary, but we need to go now."


	23. Baby Shark Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo

Mr. Laufeyson paced back and forth with thick stubble, baggy eyes, and a big cigar in his mouth. His normally confident eyes were all nervous anticipation. He heard screams and moans and squishing sounds, "all natural, all natural" he tells himself.

Angrboda told him to wait outside like in the olden days and to let the women do the women's work. He wished to be there for her, but this was her time and he respected her wishes, much to his dismay.

While pacing around the waiting room, Loki felt as though something was amiss. He looked worriedly at the receptionist who rolled her eyes, got up from her chair and went to the back to presumably check on the delivery.

9 months had passed. It was now almost 4 years since Loki had first met Angrboda. It was discovered in this time that they were to have triplets. Not just a wolf, but two more things inside of her as well, growing. Her stomach looked abnormally large, and it became necessary for her to live as her giant dog form just to hold the weight of her growing belly.

She became uncontrollably depressed as the changes came over her body. She was completely drained. No matter how much she ate, she was gaunt and pale. Her unflappable optimistic demeanor was completely gone, and she was a husk of herself by the time her water broke. It was all she could do to make it to the vet's office. The whole way telling Loki, "This feels wrong... so wrong... I want to die Loki, please just let me die... I can't do this... It hurts so badly."

"I know baby, I know, it'll all be over soon, and you'll have three beautiful babies to live for. They will be out and on their own, and you won't have to carry this weight anymore." Loki did his best to give her the sense that her relief was just a few minutes away. To give her the strength to push through while he helped her through the hospital doors.

The receptionist came back and told Loki, "It's time. Two boys and a girl. They are just beautiful."

Loki perked up, and started making his way to the back room. He opened the door, and Angrboda was covered in sweat. She was back in her human form where she could heal faster. She was holding a baby human to her breast, a small baby wolf lay curled up on her lap, and much to both their surprise, a small long thin dark green and black wingless dragon lay around Angrboda's neck like a necklace, sucking its own tail like a toddler sucks its thumb.

"The human... she has a deformity... I don't have a name for her... I wanted something hopeful, but it doesn't fit..." Said Angrboda. "I want her to be happy, but she may never find love as she is."

She turned the baby away from her chest towards Loki. She appeared as perfect, rosy cheeked little girl on one half, but her other half was completely dead. She was sunken and blackened and hideous to behold. Loki smiled at the little girl and said, "She is to be Hel, which means 'hidden.' She will stay in the places where only those who will not judge her for her appearance may see her until she is big enough to fend for herself. I will speak to my father and he will give her a place in his court, I am sure of it. She will earn a husband through her strength rather than her beauty, as husbands should be won."

"And the dragon, he's so tiny and thin! What should we do with him?" Said Angrboda.

"We give him a ferocious name! He will be Jormungandr, which means 'huge monster!' We will feed him and nurture him and train him to grow strong! He will be the fiercest biggest dragon his little body will allow him to be!" Replied Loki. Angrboda's eyes brightened for the first time in months. "I love it!" she said.

The wolf stood up from his nap and looked at Loki and his mother. "I'm starving," he said. "I need to eat, so I can grow up big and strong."


	24. Feed Me, Senpai

Loki was both immensely proud and terrified of his children. In the way that gods are born, Hel only seemed a child for an instant, and within weeks she was who the universe needed her to be. The sense of time that surrounds a god defies age and being. Once she was a part of the universe, it had been as though she were always a part of it. His daughter Hel was the best and worst parts of him and his wife. She was beautiful and courageous and sly, she was also head strong, filled with rage, and arrogance. She wielded a strange magic that allowed her to create and control darkness. She could blind anyone to the world around them, or shroud something in impenetrable shadow. She could use this to hide the mysteries of the world, or great treasure, or to strike terror into the fearful. She balanced this darkness with her opposite half, her indescribable beauty. With her control over men and women's passions she could inspire impossible courage that would seduce even the prudest or boldest of us to embrace the sweet release she could provide.

Odin was so impressed with her that shortly after meeting her as a child, he immediately granted her dominion over Helheim. She had always been ruler and always will be ruler of that place where the dead could rest, or meet the justice that their death alone was not enough for which to atone.

Jormungandr and Fenrir however aged in a different way. As the tiny dragon and the young wolf ate, they grew. Jormungandr preferred to eat fish and squid. Fenrir only wanted bleeding meet. Jormungandr was prone to laziness and spent most of his time curled up in the bath tub, sucking his tail and napping. After a quick scare it became obvious that Jormungandr was capable of breathing under water, so napping in the bath was not something that brought anxiety to the two parents.

Fenrir however seemed to love to hunt, and was an absolute glutton. He would constantly break into the pantry and fridge, throw temper tantrums if it wasn't fed when it was hungry, and would always be chasing after some animal in the yard of the house.

It seemed there was no limit to the size of these creatures, and in a few short months as they grew larger Loki and Angrboda decided it was prudent to release them in the wild. They were as big if not bigger than most of the wolves and bears of the forests around Asgard. Eventually Jormungandr became so large that Odin asked that he be moved to Midgard where he could swim in the massive oceans, and if he promised to stay hidden, he could nap and eat all the fish he wanted. Fenrir became jealous of his brother's size, and decided that he would grow as well.

Rather than eating when he was hungry, Fenrir became obsessed with food. It would finish a meal and immediately begin another hunt. Eventually he was large enough to challenge the largest grizzly bears, and after eating his fair share of them he began to devour anything and everything in the woods.

Skadi had one day come back from a hunting trip and had come back empty handed. Being the goddess of the hunt she became furious and demanded to know what was going on in the woods. Odin charged Thor with investigating the mysteries of the realms sudden lack of wildlife.

By the time he had found the beast, it was huge but starving. Thor immediately set to put the creature down, but when he threw his hammer, it missed its mark. Furthermore he found he could not call it to him. The thing looked ravenous and bared down on him with immense fury.

Thor's Motorcycle G.O.A.T. nimbly dodged through the trees as the great beast chased him. The beast was too large to weave in and out of the trees, and so it took to smashing and squeezing its way through them. Hemidall must have been paying attention, because he could hear the horn sound at once. Once Thor broke the tree line it became obvious that creature was making up for lost time, gaining quickly on him. Fortunately for him, it appeared the honored dead also recognized his peril, and rather than watch Thor put on a show of defeating the creature as they normally would have done, they charged the giant boat sized monstrosity.

The battle was quickly over, and the monster had retreated to the woods. As the battle had ended, Thor decided to set out to discover the whereabouts of his hammer, but when he turned again to his bike he felt a familiar weight on his belt. He looked down and the hammer sat at his waist as though it had never left. Thor squinted his eyes and whispered, "Loki..."


	25. Marvel Dads Suck- Change My Mind

"You don't understand! He's my son!" Cried Loki.

"I know a thing or two about sons going astray!" Boomed Odin. "You let that thing loose in my forests a few short years ago when you should have been teaching it restraint! Now the thing has gorged itself to the size of a damned ice-burg and I'm certain we are just seeing the tip. Imagine how large he will be if he devours the souls of Helheim!"

"You can't kill him! Please!" pleaded Angrboda.

"How many souls... not lives... SOULS will you let perish for his gluttony!? For your failure as parents?!" Responded the god-king.

"Surely we can reform him! Lock him up? Surely there is some other way to help him rather than kill him!" Responded Loki.

"There is no jail large enough to hold the beast, and the only reforming he deserves is to be reformed by the roots of Yggdrasil into some productive life! Something GOOD for the realms! You were a useless god-father and you're a useless father!" Argued the old man.

"Husband, don't let your fury blind your wisdom. Surely Loki will appreciate mercy now and his loyalty to you can only grow, but to kill his child would ensure he always marks you as his enemy." Said Frigga.

"I care not for the wrath of a trickster. His fury would be all illusions and lies, no substance or power behind any of it. My only concern for his loyalty is that of my adopted SON! He is my boy and I will treat him with the fairness such title requires of me." Odin barked, "But this should not be my problem. This is my decree Loki. You are to leash that dog or I will put him down. Your mother has already sent the hosts of Fensilar and Valhalla to stop him, but count yourself lucky that they won't be enough to kill the mongrel! I just hope they don't have to suffer for your lack of discipline! Should my hosts be shattered by this mutt then you will pay dearly son. Time Is NOT on your side!"

"Thank you Odin, for your mercy! My husband will not fail us! I know he won't! I won't let him!" Cried Angrboda.

Loki rushed to the forges of the god Tyr, the great swordsman. The best dwarves crafted the finest metals into the most miraculous weapons and armor. The well built, smiling and noble looking man welcomed a frantic and sweaty looking Loki into his hall, "I need a chain, Tyr."


	26. Not Quite Cate Blanchett

The strongest and most experienced of the host of Asgard stood at the bridge to the gates of Hel. A massive 3 headed dog barred their way, as well as a strange woman cloaked in shadow. She appeared nude, and yet was completely concealed by a black shroud of shadow, as if no matter how she moved, the parts of her body that titillated or offended those who were staring at her could never quite get the right angle to be exposed in the sunlight. She was incredibly beautiful, yet only the left half of her was ever even partly visible from the strange shadows that danced across her body.

"Hel, we must enter your domain," Shouted Martha from a distance. "If the wolf feeds on your charge he will grow beyond even the gods' control."

"You demand entrance?" asked Hel in a sultry but hateful voice. It sent goosebumps across the flesh of all in earshot, and none could tell if it was from fear or arousal.

"No, we offer aid." Responded Martha.

"You are a wise one to word it so." Replied the goddess. "But I cannot let you slay my brother."

"Your brother... it was not..."

"You were not told. Pesky gift that Frigga carries. She can give you a bump; she can't give you the facts though. Yes, he is my brother. I will not allow you to come into my home to kill him. You may only slow him down."

"That explains Frigga's orders; she said we were to buy time. Yes, I see now.. I agree. We will slow him down to buy the gods time." Said Martha.

Hel allowed the shadows to slip from the right side of her body. Her rosy skin and deadly curves were a perfect image of a slender, more muscular Venus. Her hair was pure golden blonde... everywhere. Her lips were an impossible shade of natural pink that perfectly matched the tips of her firm and shining breast. Martha heard a soldier next to her gulp down a swallow of nervous lust and she could understand why. Then the woman took a step forward and her right side was exposed from the shadow. It was black and grey and shriveled. The hair on that side of her head was grey and wiry. Her eye was missing and the black hole where it should have been exposed nothing but rot and bone. There were no teeth in the mouth, and the whole side of her seemed to be dead and useless. She barely managed to stand on the dead right leg as she dragged herself forward with the firm and alluring living leg on her right side. She came face to face with Martha. Most of the host backing away from the gruesome sight, but Martha standing her ground.

Hel reached forward with her dry and cracking right hand. It appeared to take her great effort to extend the dead limb to Martha. Martha blinked for a second, looked at the hand.

"Shake on it, mortal?" said Hel, daring her to accept the bargain.

Martha reached out and shook Hel's rotten hand. Dead skin came away in small flakes on Martha's fingers as she pulled away.

"You'd better hurry, your grandmother is already inside... with him."


	27. Is This A Fucking Intervention?

Blood lay strewn about the field of Helheim. The Old Lady stood ankle deep in a small pool of water. She was blindfolded with a blue cloth and stood perfectly still, holding a cast iron plate with a cast iron plate cover.

She spoke in frantic and hushed tones as screaming and chaos tore through the world around her. A giant black wolf was chasing terrified people across the field. None of them appeared to be armed.

As the wolf tore through the flesh of another mouthful of people it calmly trotted over to the curiosity. The one creature that would not run. He decided she must be a lunatic as she stood in the water muttering to herself.

"Come outside I have some breakfast for you." Said the old woman.

The wolf put his bloody snout right arms length from her and huffed out a bit of air to try to startle her. Her hair was blown back and she had to lean against the breeze but she seemed to ignore him and continued muttering.

"Oh none for you, ya big strapping lad! You'll have to fend for yourself I'm afraid. Come along deary!" said the old woman.

The wolf watched her and became irritated at the thought of being ignored. It made him feel almost small again. He used his paw to brush earth at the lady, a rock struck her head causing her to bleed from the nose and opening a small cut on her scalp.

Lilliana pulled the cast iron plate cover off of the plate exposing a beautiful chocolate and cherry cupcake. "Go on! Dig In! Made it me-self! If you don't eat the cupcake I'll haunt you forever!" The wolf stared at it and leapt towards Lillianna, just as he was about to lean in to take the cupcake, Lilliana bashed him on nose with the heavy metal cast iron plate cover.

The sting and smell of his own blood made the wolf leap back. It shook its head and smeared its paws on its snout to try to rub away the internal pain. It growled furiously as it looked back and realized the cupcake had somehow vanished.

It jumped back towards the woman and bit her in the torso, and began swinging her furiously around. "Two messages.." she continued to ignore him and mutter. He dropped her on the floor and pinned her with one paw and ripped her arm away. "Everything will be okay... mom is coming..." the beast furious that she still would not fear or respect or even acknowledge him clamped his jaws around her head as she continued to mutter, "just whisper the name Lo-..." and the beast pulled her head clean off her body.

The beast howled as it realized that this woman had ignored his violence and thrashing and rage. It didn't give him the satisfaction of the fear and respect he craved. With the beasts false confidence built on sound and fury fading, the approaching army did not appear to be the sort of challenge he was as certain he could face as before.

He ran towards them, hoping to scare them off, but they stood their ground against his false charge. Though they seemed so small they could have been giants now that he knew he did not have the power of fear on his side. The one who lead them held aloft a hammer. The thing flashed a brilliant white light the dazzled the creature. The beast clawed at his eyes and instantly realized his mistake. His rear paw was pulled out from underneath him and he felt something hook onto the paw behind that. By the time he regained his vision, the small men and woman had perfectly maneuvered themselves to each of his legs and bound them with heavy chains. They all pulled in unison and stretched the hound's limbs until they were beyond his strength to pull back.

In the distance he saw a cloud of shadow coming with something huge and green swirling in its depths and a beautiful but dark and furious man at its front.

Loki, followed by his children Hel and Jormungandr approached the wolf. "Son... we are here because we love you." Said Loki slipping a thin silver chain around his neck with the help of the long swirling serpent dragon. The dragon appeared before the wolf dwarfing its size. It pulled out a small piece of paper from beneath a scale and squinted at it.

In a deep but dull and sleepy voice, "Your food addiction has affected me in the following ways..."


	28. This Is So Sad Alexa Play Despacito

Addison sat patiently in her living room. She was sad she couldn't wear her dress for her birthday since it was ripped, and she refused to wear a skirt, the bane of all womankind. No pockets and a light breeze could spell embarrassment. She wondered for a moment if perhaps the skirt were invented by men, but then remembered that men wore kilts, tunics, loin-cloths, and all sorts of skirts and decided that sometimes it's just easier to stitch some cloth to a circle than it is to fashion pants. Still though... she loved her pockets.

She wore instead her usual baggy attire: baggy black jeans and a Slytherin tank top under a baggy black hoodie. She wore her black and white Converse shoes and she kept her earbuds on, chewing on some Extra brand gum she found that was miraculously cupcake flavored. She was riveted to a book in which a elf prince was trying desperately to bang a human queen, but they just keep putting it off every time something else happens. It made Addison exceptionally... squirmy.

A loud _DING!_ sounded and Addison jumped up and sprinted to the kitchen. The smell was entrancing. Chocolate and a smoky vanilla from the whiskey and vanilla extract was complimented by the small addition of brown sugar that gave a rustic and deep aroma. Something about butter and vanilla and brown sugar seems to bring out the glutton in most people. Addison donned her bright pink oven mitts and pulled the cupcakes from the oven.

"I heard the oven, are they ready yet?!" Addison jumped at the sound of Harold's voice.

"No, sorry, they need to cool while I make the icing. Once they're frosted I'll let you know."

"Well it smells good, happy birthday Addy. I wanted ter thank ya for inviting that boy. It really took some of the heat off me back from Little Joey. In fact, it even gave me an idea of how I could pay off me debts and even get some extra cash to boot. I even got ye a little something." Said Harold, trying his best to not look shady as fuck.

"You didn't have to, I'm a big girl, I don't need any presents." Replied the girl who absolutely needs presents.

Harold stepped forward and pulled out an envelope. It looked old and wrinkled and crumbled. She opened it up to find a child's birthday card with a big number 1 on it. She opened it and it read, "Dear Addison, You're the most perfect and beautiful girl in the whole world, and I hope you have the happiest birthday ever! Love Yer Favorite Mam." Out of the enveloped fell to the floor some obnoxious black, gold, and green glitter, and something small black and rectangular clattered to the ground.

Addison choked back a sob and reached for her father. He didn't know quite how to hug a girl so he just let her lean on him and patted her back. She felt a sharp pain in her right buttock and jumped to the side with a squeal. She glanced at the man's hand and he was holding three of his needles, and they all appeared to be empty.

"Sorry love, but I ain't got nuffin' else ta sell. You understand." Said Harold.

Addison ran through her knowledge of drugs in her head. After discovering her dad was on heroin, she did some research. She knew that if it were injected into a muscle rather than her veins then she had about 5 minutes before it would take effect. She scanned the kitchen, all the knives were missing from the knife block. She pulled open the nearest drawer, whisks and spatulas, but the meat tenderizer was missing.

"You're just like your mother, you rotten hag," snarled Harold. Then he lunged at her. They fumbled around on the floor as he pinned her down. She struggled desperately to gain some footing, or find some way to weasel out of his grip. She felt herself growing weaker and weaker, realizing that time was running out. She was about to pass out from the over-sized dose of the drug she had been given. She was unarmed and overpowered. Still she wanted every second. She strained to keep herself awake and as she faded she saw something next to the card and glitter that had strewn about the ground. A black and green business card that read, "If you or your daughter need anything, whisper my name." Addison whispered aloud the next words, "Loki of Asgard." It was a foolish hope, and she knew she didn't have the strength to hold on to consciousness any longer, but she was willing to try anything she could to survive. She thought she began to hear voices from the next room, and wondered if she was already beginning to sleep or hallucinate. She had no idea how much of the drug she had been given or what the effects would be, but she knew it was a lot, and she was going to fade. Finally she knew she felt the end. A high pitched squeal began to ring in her ears, and everything began fading to a blinding white as her dead mother's face appeared over the shoulder of her father. "Is this how I die?" she wondered. "At least I finally get to meet Mom."

The vision of her deceased mother spoke with a beautiful Irish accent that felt like a cool spring breeze carried over the melting snows of winter. "Mom is coming; everything is going to be okay." Then everything faded to black.


	29. YES! That's What It Feels Like

Freya stood before Martha in a bright and golden hall. Behind her hovered what appeared to be a massive throng of angels. Martha kneeled in front of the beautiful and terrifying godess pledging to be the mother to all brave men and women who die fighting. She pledged to uphold the best and truest ideals and promised that she would defy any dishonorable order given to her, and that she would fight fiercely for all of the innocent lives in all the nine realms. She would swear off any hatreds or biases she held, for in the eyes of the great mother there were only two types of beings. Those of malice, cruelty and darkness, and those of honor, courage, and love.

Freya held a sword high into the air that shined with a golden light, she tapped Martha on each shoulder, and from behind them sprouted white and glorious wings. She could feel the weight of them but more importantly, the strength of them.

Freya bid her to stand and announced to all that she would be Viking. She would be Berserker. She would be Righteous fury and deadly discipline. She would be Valkyrie.

As Martha stood, her thick red hair fell back behind her shoulders and touched her wings. She spread them to their full length and they were massive. They were just a tad further than twice her arms reach, and she could bend and flex the muscles that ran along them. She pounded downward and the strength of her wings caught the wind and sent her floating into the air. She realized that there was an intuitive magic to them as she was able to stay afloat without flapping or straining.

She willed herself back to the ground and folded her wings. Once they were completely folded and relaxed they melded to her clothing appeared as a hooded cloak of white swan feathers. She stood a full three feet shorter than the great goddess, Queen of the Valkyries but her chest filled with pride.

"Martha, Valkyrie of Asgard, warrior, uniter of the houses of Valhalla and Fensilar, wolf breaker, oath keeper, and most of all mother. I grant you the boon of vengeance. Go now and slay the demon who took you from your daughter."

Freya touched Martha's forehead with her sword and she found herself standing at the foot of the bifrost bridge. Heimdall opened the gates for her and shouted, "Fight well! Show no mercy!"

As she steeped through the threshold of the bridge, she found herself standing in her old living room. The place was disheveled and smelled a bit like mildew and old beer. There was a bare spot on the wall where a massive T.V. used to be mounted. It seemed that everything that had remotely held any value was gone. There was a bag of a white substance sitting on the table in front of the couch with a needle sitting next to it. There were rubber tubes and a tarnished bent spoon and a small lighter.

"Oh Harold... you always had the worst taste in friends," Martha said to herself. She heard a clattering and turned towards the sound. Harold's feet were poking out from behind the entryway of the kitchen. There was thumping and slapping sounds, and what sounded like a whisper. Martha sensed immediate and terrible danger and spun around behind her. Lounging on the couch now, was a tall and incredible looking man. She recognized his powerful green eyes and his devilish smirk.

"Oh Loki! You've decided to join us." Sneered Martha. "Shall we?"

"Oh no dear, he's all yours. I hate to admit it, but without my magic, you're far more formidable than me in a straight up confrontation."

"You have no magic?"

"One of the small prices I had to pay in order to get this visit, no time to explain, go see to your husband."

Martha smiled and turned to the kitchen. When she saw the disgusting man atop his own daughter she pulled her hammer from her belt. She willed it to shine as bright as the sun and to light up the room with hope. The metal sing a high pitched tune as it built with righteous power. She leaned forward to make eye contact with Addison and said, "Mom is coming; everything is going to be okay." Her little girl faded from consciousness and Martha thought it was all for the better. What was coming next was not for her eyes.

Harold turned startled at the sound and the sudden light saw only the pure white blinding glare of the hammer.

Martha flicked off the light of the hammer in an instant and the hammer hummed with strength. The man looked helpless as he felt around trying to find purchase. She tilted her head to crack her neck, then dropped the hammer on his foot.

"Ah bloody fuckin' 'ell!" shouted Harold. He tried to pull his foot away but it was crushed and completely stuck. He reached down and grabbed the handle and pulled but it was immovable.

"If you had an ounce of love for your little girl, you could free yourself. But you love only yourself. You will hurt anyone to get the smallest bit of gain, and you have squandered everything I had to give her after my death. You took my inheritance, you took my life, and you took my future with my daughter. Now you pay for everything." Martha said.

Harold rubbed his eyes, blinking, his vision slowly returning to him. He saw in front of him a hardened, confident, and fearless version of his lost wife. "I killed you once, and I'll do it again. You're just a woman. You're weaker. You're more emotional. You ain't got no sense." Responded Harold.

"I might have been physically weaker, but I was always stronger. My emotions are the passion that gives me that strength. And I have sense enough to know that when we're done, Hel will be waiting."

With that Harold swung at Martha. His giant fist struck air as Martha slipped to the side and sent her smaller fist driving straight for his ribs. There was an audible crack and Harold bellowed in pain. His other hand swung a blind haymaker towards her and she ducked under punching him in the gut. Her smaller tighter fist was liking being poked in the belly with the small end of a baseball bat. It forced him to wheeze out air and struggle for breath.

Quickly realizing that she was too quick on her feet for him to strike, he grabbed at her and managed to fill his fist with a handful of her hair. He dragged her head to a favorable position and started to punch her in the face. She covered up using the full length of her forearms and elbows to protect her head. His powerful punches still rattled her a bit as they connected, but they were softened by her guard enough to keep him from doing any real harm. She planted one foot against his gut, and arched her back and began to push against him. She grunted in pain as she felt a tearing across her scalp.

After a ripping sound and a sharp burning sensation she found herself free of the grip. Harold was holding a handful of detached hair now reaching for her but his foot was still trapped under the hammer. Martha stepped back a bit and Loki stepped into the room handing her something bright green. "First thing I learned when fighting my brother? Always keep a hair tie handy." Martha tied up her hair and looked the large man up and down. She glanced at Loki, "Lose the hammer?" she said. "Lose the hammer," Loki confirmed, "You only get to do this once, you might as well enjoy it."

Martha stretched out her hand and the hammer came to her. She set it on top of Harold's heroine in the living room grinding it to nothing. Harold looked at her and charged. As she came towards him she placed her hands on his shoulders and shot her hips and feet backwards, driving his momentum into the ground. She kept her weight on his back and kneed him in the side of his head. He quickly turned onto his back and whilst still knocked prone grabbed the leg she was standing on. She immediately stomped on the hand snapping his thumb. Harold growled in pain and tried to roll to standing. As he got his feet under him Martha pounced on his bent back and wrapped her arm around his neck preventing him from standing. She began to squeeze his neck tightening her grip and denying him sweet precious oxygen. He drove forward, making her run backwards with his weight, and she nimbly stepped up and over the coffee table, the couch and even partially walked up the wall backwards making him bear even more of her weight.

When he felt the center of gravity shift upward, Harold leaned back hard flipping her over him, causing them both to land on the floor head to head on their backs. Martha was instantly back on her feet and showed no sign of pain. He began a serious of tricky punches with his huge heavy hands, but as soon as he started she stepped back and kicked him sharply on the side of the knee. He began again and was met with the same response. The front of her shin was hitting the side of his, and while he had meat to cushion the blow, her shin bones were taking it straight on. He realized that despite her taking the raw end of the deal, she still showed no pain. She grab the shoulders of his shirt and began kicking him over and over again in the leg. He tried to step backwards to create to much distance, but it just exposed the other leg. He couldn't wrap his head around how she was wearing him down. He struggled desperately against her grip and tried to shove her away. He started slamming onto her forearms trying to break her hold. Every time he punched them and hammered down upon them he felt the bones cutting into his knuckles or palms or wrists. He even used his head as a last ditch effort, and felt as their foreheads collided that he was getting dizzier and weaker by the second.

She kept at it until his legs began to fail him. His arms exhausted and battered began to droop. His forehead cut and bleeding as was Martha's. He fell to his knees and panted wheezing for air. Martha walked around behind him and grabbed his jaw and the back of his head.

"I'm stronger... I'm stronger... men are stronger... how could you..." Harold asked bewildered.

"Women have more pain tolerance." said Martha with a sneer. She quickly jerked her hands to the sides and Harold's head turned a few degrees more than his neck could tolerate. He sputtered rasping breaths as he was paralyzed and slowly drowning in the blood dripping down his throat from his own bloody nose.

Martha picked up her daughter and carried her to her bed. She tucked her covers around her and kissed her on the forehead. She smiled serenely and squeezed her daughter's hand as tears ran down her face. Light began to fill the room and Martha knew her job was done. She wanted more time, there was so much she wanted to say, so many things she wanted to give her daughter and teach her. Ultimately though, she was grateful for this moment. To be able to tuck her baby girl into bed just one more time. She faded out of Midgard and back to Freya's hall.

"She's not out of the woods yet..." said one of the Valkyries as Martha appeared.

"What do you mean?" asked Martha.

"Her father has debts to pay..."


	30. Shifty Business

**A/N Only one more chapter after this. !**

Addison awoke in her bed. She had a terrible headache and turned over to vomit. She heaved but nothing came out. Her stomach was cramped and empty and there was a sharp ringing in her ears. She heard a noise downstairs and began to crawl out of bed. She was still in her hoodie and baggy black jeans, but her shoes had been taken off and placed next to her door. She ignored them and slowly made her way down the stairs trying not to jar her head any more than necessary.

She could smell chocolate and vanilla and the woodsy aroma of aged whisky. She turned the corner into her kitchen and there was a tall beautiful man with slightly oily black hair and grey-ish pale skin wearing a black and green suit, but with a comical pink apron tied around his front. He was squeezing a pink bag of home-made icing onto her recently finished cupcakes. She raised her eyebrows at him but didn't even bother to ask who he was or what he was doing in her house. She just walked over, grabbed a handful of cupcake and shoved it into her face.

"I hope you don't mind, I stole some of your father's Naloxone and crammed it down your throat while you were sleeping. You'd have overdosed and suffocated in your sleep otherwise."

"My father?" She said in between bites of cupcake.

"Dead I'm glad to say."

Addison just chewed and nodded.

"You here to kill me? One of Joey's men?"

"I very well could have just let you die if that were my purpose. No, Joey didn't have your father killed. He was perfectly happy to milk him for all he could think to sell. It was a real angel that came and saved you and dispatched the old man. I was just fortunate enough to watch, and decided to help you clean up the mess to follow. Although it is well within your power to clean it on your own..."

"Yeah right... my mother died, my dad can beat me up, no one knows I exist, I have no money, I have no friends, I have no family, I'm not even pretty enough to be a stripper... all I can do is die, or live and see what the universe wants to do with me."

"Addison, you are exactly where you want to be."

"That's a terrible fucking thing to say to someone in my shoes! Fuck you! Gimme another cupcake."

"NO no... what I mean to say is..." said Loki handing her another cupcake, "You can be whatever you want."

"Bullshit, that's just what people say to kids to make them keep trying to get good grades. Nobody wants to be an insurance adjuster or a cashier, that's just where life throws them."

"You're not getting my point..."

"Because it's stupid! Who the fuck are you anyway?"

"Listen, please, when... when you were at home, you wanted to be invisible. You wanted to be the dullest, greyest, most inconsequential girl you could be so your father would ignore you. You were exactly what you wanted to be. When you were at school, you still were too wrapped up in your home life to be anyone but that dull grey girl. When you were watching your father take drugs, he heard you, and he looked for you on the stairs, but you wanted to be unseen, you wanted to meld with the shadows and blend in with your surroundings, and even though he looked right at you... you couldn't be seen. You were too still, too dark, too quiet. When you wanted to be strong and terrifying and you slapped your father in the face, you didn't just hurt him. You remember your arm looking thick with muscle. You sent him reeling to the side. When he called you a little brat you felt it and you wanted to be small, and you could feel yourself shrinking in front of him. You don't have your mother's eyes or your fathers eyes... you have green eyes. You have MY green eyes."

"How do you know all that? Have you been stalking me? Who the fuck are you?! What the fuck are you even talking about?!"

Loki tilted his head towards her in a small nod and said, "I am Loki of Asgard, and I'm trying to tell you that you are a shape shifter."


	31. Lie Someone To Death

**A/N Wow! You guys made it to the end. Hope you loved it! Feel free to drop reviews with comments and tell us whether it's worth it to write a sequel/spinoff/a totally different story. 3**

As the dirty white box truck pulled up to the house, Loki took a deep breath and stepped outside. 7 men filed out of the vehicle, each one looking as rugged and confident as the last. Little Joey Rattan led the group with 3 men on either side, flanking him like a flock of geese in their flying V formation. Nestled in the center of the V behind all of the men was a soft flabby little boy with a tribly and a t-shirt that said "Klopper 4 Lyf!" Joey was yelling at someone on his phone. "I dunno, he was supposed to call an hour ago, I'm kicking his door in to see what's what! I dunno, there's some pikey standing outside like a bouncer, I gotta go."

"Listen friend, move, or get moved, comprende?" Joey said to Loki.

Loki shot him a venomous smirk and began to outstretch his hands and twirl them in a single fluid and practiced motion. Joey cracked him across the face with a big right hook and Loki hit the dirt. "Right... no magic..." Loki said as his eyes rolled into the back of his head.

The men entered the room to find Addison who appeared to be sleeping on the couch, still groggy apparently from the drugs she had been given earlier. They grabbed her hard and she awoke screaming, they forced her failing form up the stairs to the bedroom and tied her to her bed. They tied a gag around her mouth and left her there with just the skinny one to watch her and make sure she stayed put. They went back down and dragged Loki's limp body into the living room and tied him to a chair as well.

"You think we should kill the hero, boss?" one of the men asked, "Nah, look at'em, he's a pretty boy, someone might still want to pay for him. All types these days..."

In a few short seconds the door to Addison's bedroom opened again. The pasty disgusting boy squeezed himself in through the door. "I have to thank you Addison, you're right, everyone is wearing fedora's, Trilbies are where it's at." He crawled on top of her and the bed sank deeply towards the ground. His weight was almost as suffocating as his stench. It was clear he hadn't taken the time to shower, and the cologne he lathered on in layers was no substitute for the lack of deodorant or fresh underwear. Addison would have gagged if she had not already _been_ gagged.

He began to lick her face, his hot breath reeking against her face. She started to mumble some pleading words as his fingers wormed their way up her shirt and under her bra. "What's that?" he said as he sat up straddling her. He lifted her gag so she could speak.

"Please... let me at least take my birth control pill... they're in my purse down the hall in the bathroom..."

"Shit. Good thinkin', I don't want to be saddled with no kids... they are the worst."

Johnny got up and headed down the hall. The skinny man turned his back to Addison as he watched Johnny to make sure this wasn't some sort of trap. No sooner had the thought crossed his mind that some sort of black thick rope slipped around his neck. He struggled to pull it off, but the leathery rope coiled around his arms and bent his legs out from underneath him. He tried to call out but the air would not escape his lungs. He fell backwards, squirming and gasping for air. His face turned beet red, and as the thing constricted him tighter and tighter, he found himself face to face with a black Anaconda with green eyes. Its tail slowly pushed the door shut, and its fangs ripped into his face.

Once his neck was broken and his airway surely crushed, Addison transformed back into herself and pulled the skinny man onto the bed. She knew it was only a matter of time before Johnny would be back after she sent him on a wild goose chase for nonexistent pills. She was ripping her outer clothes off and putting them onto the man desperately trying to conceal his face with the hoody when the door creaked open. Addison was in her underwear only with her back to the door. She instantly thought of the rules Loki had explained to her.

"You have to genuinely believe, and want, to be something, and your body will transform to that image in an instant. You don't have to give it every specific detail; your subconscious will fill in the rest. Just genuinely believe and want to be something and you will become it."

At this instant, she genuinely believed and wanted to be every porn addled boy's dream girl. Her breasts and butt stretched her underwear to bursting. He lips became pouty and full. Her red hair sprouted a tuft from her pubic area showing just a tad from the edges of her now too small panties. She looked down at herself and mildly appreciated the healthy cleavage and even underboob she was producing. She looked soft and weak, but still managed to have a small ab line. Her face had transformed to a perfect blend of Margot Robbie and Marilyn Monroe. She turned around and bent over towards the short greasy chump. She was spilling out of her bra and he could not stop his wide eyed stare.

"Wh- who- what- who are you?" stammered the boy as he let out a gulp.

Addison put on her best Harley Quinn accent, "Your pops thought Addison was too plain for your first time, so he sent me in as back-up. Kind of a two for one deal, is that okay Mr. J?" She added a bounce for good measure.

Johnny nodded.

"So hop on top and let's get started!"

Johnny nodded.

"Any time now..."

Johnny nodded.

"Christ..." Addison grabbed the boy and threw him onto the man tied to the bed wearing her clothes.

Johnny started writhing and dry humping the form on the bed and licked the face of the body. He reached his hand down the black baggy jeans and then whispered, "what the-" just as the busty porn starlet stabbed into the side of his neck with the knife the skinny man had been keeping in his pocket.

Downstairs Loki shared the room with Joey and one other gangster. "Hey Mick, why don't you fix us some coffee?"

Loki said, "Mick, would you mind explaining to this fine gentleman why I'm here, and tell him that this is no way for your underlings to conduct business?"

Joey turned, "Keep your mouth shut you damn hippie."

"Hippie? Mick, are you going to let your manservant treat me this way? I won't be buying any more drugs from you if you can't keep your staff in line."

"Mickey don't sell drugs. He's just muscle. You'd keep your mouth shut if you knew what's good for you..."

"Yeah!" said Mick, looking bewildered.

"OH! I get it! YOU'RE the patsy!" Loki said looking to Joey.

"The what now?" Said Joey.

"Oh nothing, I've said too much..."

"So you're saying you were here to buy some supply... from Mick?"

"Oh no, I never said that, ignore me, I'm just furniture!"

"You want I should smack you around some more?!"

"Goodness no! Fine I'll talk! Just don't hurt me!" Said Loki cowering back into his chair.

"Alright, spill..."

"So Mick here told me he was going to sell me a boat load of drugs at a discount. Said he had a source that was too confident, easy to knock over if you knew the right time to strike. Said he had a soft spot for his kid, so he could use him as leverage if he ran into trouble. In any event I was supposed to meet him here in a couple of hours to help him clean up 3 bodies and exchange cash for heroin." Said Loki frantically.

"3 bodies?"

"The Patsy, the kid, and some girl he said."

"Mick... you were gonna bump my kid?!"

"No boss! I swear!"

"You were gonna try to knock over Little Joey Rattan and Big Johnny? An kill me and my fuckin' kid?!"

"I would never!"

"Then who the fuck is this guy?"

"I-I dunno!"

"You don't know!? He seems to know us pretty well! He seems to know your name Mick... let me ask you something. How come he knows your name, but doesn't know who the fuck I am? Sounds like he thinks you're the big-wig around here!"

"No boss I swear you gotta believe me!"

Rattan pulls out a small revolver. "I knew you were a mook from the second I saw you Mick! Mickey fuckin' Mouse? More like Mickey the Fuckin' Rat!"

BANG BANG!

Two shots rang out and Mick dropped dead.

4 men all ran into the room from other parts of the house.

"Everything alright boss? I heard some shots." Asked one of the bigger men.

"NO!" said Loki. "The big guy's insane! He just said he's sick of cutting in all these lackies and needed to drop some dead weight! He said two more of you were going to have to go!"

The 4 men pulled their guns and pointed them at Joey.

"Don't you listen to him! He's full of shit! He's tied to a fuckin' chair! He's just tryin to save his own ass!"

"No, it's true..." came a deep voice from the top of the stairs.

Everyone looked to see the skinny henchman walking down the stairs twirling his knife.

"He said Mick was a waste of good hard cash, and that he was gonna cut off some dead weight tonight since he already had a cleanup crew on the way. I heard it all from up here."

Loki winked at Addison who had shifted into the form of the skinny man and stolen his clothes.

"Listen boss, it ain't nothin' personal..."

Joey jumped behind a couch firing three shots wildly as he did. The four henchmen across the room returned fire and missed. Rather than attempt to get better position or find where Joey was, they decided to let their fire power do the hard work in pure gangster fashion. They just unloaded magazine after magazine into the couch until blood started to spill out from underneath it soaking a rug under the coffee table.

Once the shooting stopped the guys looked around in the surreal atmosphere of flying couch stuffing and the ear ringing silence, they noticed only 3 of them were standing. One of Joey's wild shots as he jumped behind the couch had found a home square into the forehead of the largest of the 4 men.

Just then, a strange silence and darkness overwhelmed them as the power died.

"Guys! One of you get up here! I can't find Johnny! He's gonna rat us out to the fuzz if he gets out!" screamed a voice from upstairs.

All three of them started to scramble for the stairs. Loki shouted, "No! I'm not getting caught up in this mess too! Two of you cover the exits! There's no way that gunfire isn't getting called in. We only have a few seconds to find the kid, now untie me so I can help!" Shouted Loki.

"Yeah? And who the fuck are you?" Said one of the men fumbling towards the chair in the dark while the other two scrambled up the stairs.

The man felt his way over to the chair and found that the ropes were slack and there didn't feel to be anyone in the chair at all.

"I'm a liar" the man heard in a soft voice from behind.

 _BANG_

Loki stood behind the corpse slumped over the chair holding Joey's now empty revolver.

"Pauly?" called a voice from upstairs, "You okay?"

"No! The fuckin' pretty boy cut me pretty bad, I had to shoot him. Help me tie this thing off before I bleed out!" Came a voice from downstairs. "Okay I'm comin' Pauly!"

One of the men began fumbling through the dark back down the stairs.

The other began searching room by room upstairs using his phone as a flash light with his small caliber pistol gun in front of him. "Come on out Johnny..." he said. He heard a creaking sound and an enormous thumping from the hallway. "Fat clumsy fuck..." he muttered as he turned and stepped back out the door. As a he did a mass of grey was barreling right towards him. He fired off his small little gun, but it seemed to have no effect. No blood squirted out, the form did not stop or even slow. The last thing that entered his thought before he was gored and crushed to death was, "Who the fuck keeps a god-damned rhino as a pet?"

Addison instantly learned that transforming was something that would require a bit more foresight. She had guessed right that his little peashooter wouldn't pierce the Rhino's thick hide, but she hadn't predicted that transforming into something so large would tear her clothes to bits. She scampered back into her room covering herself, smirking at the two dead men on her bed. It made her smile just a bit to realize that Johnny the virgin died holding another man's balls.

She threw on some loose fitting clothing and walked downstairs. She truly and genuinely wanted her eyes to be able to see better in the dark, and alas they could. In her low-light vision she could see Loki hunched over a man sitting on his knees crying. Loki was whispering something into his ear. Addison sharpened her hearing.

"... and that dead little boy and girl up their all tied up and twisted, you know what they'll think. And you know you'll take the fall since you're the last man standing... and the rest of your life you'll be thought of as the child molester who got life in prison. You'll be raped every day until you some day die from all of the diseases and wounds that will never close because they will constantly be reopened by cock after cock while all you can do is hope death comes soon. But in prison you'll get the best medical care tax dollars can buy, whether you want it or not. You know you only have one way out of this. You know what you have to do. Don't be a pussy now, or be someone's pussy for the rest of your long miserable life..."

The man sobbing put the gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger.

"Jesus..." said Addison.

"God of trickery and deceit... if I couldn't lie 7 men to death then what good would I be?"

"Excuse me?"

"Okay fine, You killed two of them and the rapist boy. But it was my deceit that sent them into your hands. I gave you the birth control idea so you have to give me at least half a point for that one..."

"6.5 points then..."

"Yay! I'm winning at something!"

"New to you?"

Sirens started wailing in the distance.

"Alright, time for act two!"

"We had a second act?"

"Exeunt Loki, chased by bear!"

Addison turned into a bear.

"I was quoting Shakespeare... it just means we run for our lives..."

The bear let out a groan as it looked down at more ripped clothing on the floor.

Loki's eyebrow twitched. "No time to change, looks like you'll have to go nak-"

The bear roared.

"Fiiiiine! Ruin all my fun..." muttered Loki.

Loki turned his back out of polite modesty as Addison transformed and scampered back up the stairs for yet another change of clothes.

Loki peeked... because he's a fucking liar... and a pervert...

THE END! Comment or review or something if you want a sequel! I'm thinking of doing a sequel...


End file.
